Road to Nowhere (32 page)

“If I say yes, what are you going to do?”

“Bring in the State Police.”

“Then I’ll say no.” He said it right away. “They couldn’t either have been killed any other way than I said in the first place. That’s final.”

“Then I’ll bring in the State Police anyway, and their own doctors.”

That made the man think even more than he had before.

“Don’t,” he said.

“Why not?” Joe asked.

“There’s more to it than you know,” Colony said. “And I won’t say what. I’ll tell you this: nothing happened to Wade Harris and nothing happened to Mort Walker. But if you bring in the State Police, they’ll think they have to find something, and they’ll look until they do.”

“You’re saying there’s something they’d find?”

“Yes. It’s nothing to do with Wade Harris, but they’ll think it is.”

Fool business. “I’m not much satisfied with that, Dr. Colony. You’re hiding something.”

“I don’t care whether you’re satisfied or not. You’d do better to just stay out of it. If you don’t, you’ll wish you had. I’m warning you.”

Wicked, evil business. “I’ll consider that,” Joe said.

“Consider it, Esterhouse. Then don’t make the wrong decision. And don’t listen to Roger Gallaudet.”

Time for a little telephone call to Asheville.

“Department of Transportation, Mike Fletcher.”

“Mikey! It’s Steve Carter.”

“No one else calls me Mikey.”

“Somebody needs to. I got a question.”

“Shoot.”

“Remember back in April? You gave me some traffic estimates for the proposed Gold River Highway.”

“I remember.”

“Good. So, I finally saw the plans, and they’re out of whack. NCDOT wants to build an interstate over our mountain.”

“That doesn’t sound right. It was only a couple thousand cars a day.”

“Right. But the twenty-year estimates they used were fifteen thousand.”

“There aren’t that many cars in Jefferson County.”

“So—what kind of funny business is somebody up to?” Steve asked.

“Well, the usual kind, I guess. I’ll try to find out.”

“Sit down, Joe. You look beat.”

“Thank you, Roger.” The funeral home had nice soft chairs, and anymore Joe was appreciating an occasional rest.

“How’s Rose?”

“Well as I am.”

“That doesn’t tell me a thing.”

“I suppose.” He was tired, now that he’d sat. “I’m here to have a talk, and after Gordon Hite and Everett Colony, it’s a relief to not be contending and adverse.”

Roger laughed at that. “I can’t promise I won’t be.”

“Don’t think you’ll match those two. And I suppose you know what we’ve been talking about.”

“I suppose!” Roger looked as tired as Joe felt. “It’s enough to make me retire. Maybe I’d open a restaurant. Tell me what they said, Joe, if you want, but you know I don’t really want to hear it.”

“You don’t need to, except a couple things. Gordon says you’ve talked about Wade Harris to Roland Coates and Randy McCoy and Steve Carter.”

“He said what? I know Roland and Randy, but who’s the other one?”

“Steve took Wade’s place on the Board of Supervisors.”

“I’ve never met him, much less talked to any of them about anything.”

“That’s what I thought. But they’ve all been asking Gordon questions about Wade, so he’s blaming you for stirring them up.”

“I’ve only talked to you, Joe, and to Gordon himself. What questions were they asking?”

“I don’t know. I’ll have to find out.” Too much to think about. “Roger. You’ve said that you and Everett Colony have tangled before. Now Gordon’s told him you’re spreading rumors about him.”

“Sounds like they’re the ones spreading rumors about me.”

“Any other reason Everett Colony would be set against you?”

“I don’t know, Joe. Can’t think of anything else.”

“Any other reason you’d be set against him?”

Roger thought about that question. “What do you mean?”

“He’s against Gold River Highway. You tried to change his mind.”

“That was months ago.” Roger was showing his own temper. “I talked with him as a neighbor just to be cooperative, but it turned out we didn’t see eye to eye. Grace said I should.”

“How do you feel about the road?”

“I don’t know.” The man was frustrated, too. “I suppose I’m for it, but it’s more a nuisance than anything else.” Then he shook his head. “And it’s not any reason for me to say that I’m worried about what happened to Wade Harris. I’m saying that on my own, and I’m saying again I don’t know anything for certain anyway. Talking to Everett Colony was my mistake, and I should have known not to bother.”

July 10, Monday

“Stevie. It’s Mike Fletcher.”

“No one else calls me Stevie.”

“Somebody needs to. You asked about traffic estimates?”

“I did.”

“When I did those for you, I just used standard linear assumptions. We guess what the development will be based on the population, and then we guess what the population will be based on the development. Basic circular reasoning. You know.”

“Right.”

“Well, your highway has something bigger planned.”

“What?”

“I don’t know. This is one of those special jobs where we use confidential plans from a developer. Only the team engineering that highway has access to the information, and I’m not on that team. You’d have to talk to Bob Jarvis.”

“I don’t want to. I’ve met him. So there is something, you just can’t tell me what.”

“That’s it. If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

“Don’t worry, there are people here that might do that anyway.”

“But here’s a clue. When I was talking to Jarvis, I just said a friend of mine had called to ask. Apparently, someone’s been bugging him, and he wondered if it was the same person. He asked me if it was some lady with the Warrior Land Trust.”

“Never heard of it. Was there a name?”

“Yeah. It was the owner of the trust. Um—some weird last name. Started with Gul- or Gel-something.”

“I have no idea who that might be,” Steve said. “Uh—well, the one lady I can think of doesn’t even own a telephone.”

“Then that’s all I know.”

“Well, then thanks, I guess.”

“You’re welcome, I guess,” Mike said.

“Randy McCoy, can I help you?”

“This is Joe Esterhouse.”

Randy had to swallow down his surprise at that, because he hadn’t got more than two telephone calls from Joe in his whole life, and maybe not that many, and surely it wasn’t just his imagination right now.

“What can I do for you, Joe?”

“I heard you talked to Gordon Hite. About bullets.”

It must be his imagination, because it was impossible that Joe could have heard about that.

“Well, I did, I guess, but it wasn’t anything particular or serious.”

“What did you ask him?”

“I’d found a bullet and I just happened to be going by the sheriff’s office, and I stopped in to ask if he knew where it might have come from.” And if that wasn’t about the silliest answer he’d ever given, he didn’t know what was.

“You found a bullet and you asked him where it came from.”

“Now, Joe, there’s more to it, but that’s all I said to Gordon.”

“Where’d you find the bullet?”

He didn’t have much chance of putting off Joe when Joe wasn’t wanting to be put off, and Joe Esterhouse usually had a reason for asking a question, and there wasn’t really any reason not to tell him anything anyway. And Joe calling Randy on the telephone was almost as much a show of respect as Randy driving down to Marker for breakfast to meet Joe.

“Well, I found it in my car. Now, this has been months ago.”

“Just laying there?”

“No, down in the seat. Inside the seat, where I dug it out.”

“Did somebody shoot at your car?”

“I can’t believe they would, Joe, and that’s the truth. It wouldn’t make sense. And I’d be all the more sure they hadn’t except that the windshield got broken to pieces around the same time, and I thought it was just a rock because it happened just as one of Roland Coates’ furniture trucks went by, and I’m still sure that’s what it must have been, but I decided to just see what Gordon might say, even though it ended up not being much.”

“Did you tell him it was in your car?”

“No, I didn’t, just that I’d found it, as I didn’t really want him to be jumping to any conclusions.”

That got a pause out of the telephone.

“What conclusion did you think he might jump to, Randy?”

“I don’t know.” Why did Joe always have to cut through everything to the bone? “I don’t know. Oh, Joe, it was right there, at the same time as Wade’s accident, and I just wasn’t thinking straight. Because if someone shot at my car, they could have done the same to Wade, and I know that’s just too ridiculous and terrible to be the least bit true, but I just wasn’t thinking straight to even have the thought in my head.”

“So it was all just your own ideas?”

“Well, sure, and not for more then a few days at that. Why are you asking all this, Joe?”

“Because there’s no trouble like there is with a road.”

“You say that a lot, Joe, and I wonder what you mean by it.”

Joe’s voice out of the telephone was dry as an August creek bed. “Roads mean change, like nothing else. Building the interstate, building the first part of Gold River Highway, even the new bridge in Wardsville. They were all fights.”

“Before my time, I suppose,” Randy said. “But it’s true that I’ve never seen trouble like with this road.”

July 19, Wednesday

“You know, it’s nice out here. Peaceful.” Roland Coates rocked back and forth like a machine, and Eliza just listened. “Good to get away once in a while. Not that the business doesn’t need constant watching. But I’m getting old.”

“Not old at all,” Eliza said. “But sometimes in need of rest.”

“I am that. I could use a lot more than I get, but somebody has to keep things running. Anyway, that’s why I’m out here. I need the board to fix my zoning.”

Another of those words! Zoning! What things people worried about.

“What is broken?”

“Broken? Oh . . . well, the zoning. If anybody’s going to build on to the factory, the county needs to change the zoning. I don’t know what it all means.”

Perhaps no one did! “I don’t either!”

“At least we agree on that. You see, I’m worrying that the road might not happen. So I’m going to try for the zoning anyway. Maybe that’ll do it, and I can get that factory sold without the road.”

“You wouldn’t need the road?” This thought seemed to step out from the forest of his words.

“I don’t know how likely I am to get it. Everett Colony and his crew are squeaking louder than all the other wheels put together.”

“Squeaking?”

“But there’s more. Eliza, I can talk to you. Now, this is just between you and me, you know. You wouldn’t go telling anybody else any of this.”

“I don’t think I could!”

“Good. It’s Jeremy. I don’t know what he’s up to, but it’s no good. He’s going to break this deal one way or the other, if he can. Shooting out car windows! As if that would change a person’s mind. More like to get the boy sent to jail. I had him tell that fool of a sheriff what he’d done, and he said he’d let it by. But he’ll do more, I know it.”

“What will he do?”

“We’ll find out. I’ve got my suspicions. But it all comes down to the board. When you vote on the zoning, there’s nothing he can do about it. And more than anything, when you vote on that road. That’s the only thing that counts anyway.”

July 20, Thursday

“Over here.”

Now, where was that voice coming from? Steve was around somewhere. Randy could hear him. There was Grace Gallaudet across the street by the funeral home . . . Ed Fiddler just coming out of the bank . . .

“Randy! Over here!”

There he was. Way out on the middle of the bridge. Randy waved and jogged across Main Street and over onto the bridge, where Steve was waiting for him.

“There you are,” Randy said. “I was starting to wonder where you’d gotten to.”

“I’m sorry,” Steve said. “I was looking at the flood plain.”

“I guess we can see it all from here.”

Randy looked at it. Along here, with the far side of the river being that sharp bank, the flood plain was basically downtown Wardsville. The first row of buildings backed against the river, then Main Street, and then the second row of buildings across from the first, with the courthouse right facing the bridge and the Episcopal Church next to it, and the drugstore on its other side, and more stretching out either way from there. King Food down at the end, and the stoplight for Hemlock, and Gabe’s garage down at the other end. Then Ashe Street parallel to Main Street and its buildings, with Randy’s own office in there. Then all the houses of River View scratched into the hillside where the land started rising up, and Mountain View up and out of sight.

“What was the flood like, back in ’77?” Steve asked.

“It was a mess, let me tell you. We lost the bridge, and I guess to kind of make it up to us, the river left a foot or two of mud everywhere.”

“What did people do without the bridge?”

“We went down to the bridge at Coble. It seemed like forever getting this new bridge built, but I think it was just about eight months.”

“That was fast.”

“Even for back then, it was fast. Looking back, I think Joe Esterhouse must have had something to do with it. But Steve, this bridge doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere. That old one was a pretty rickety affair and it was no surprise it washed out. I don’t think we need be worrying about it now.”

“Okay.” Steve was looking down at the Fort Ashe River. “I’ve been through the engineering drawings. I agree with you, it would be one massive flood to take this bridge out. But it’s still the only way into town, except Coble Highway and Ayawisgi Road. Doesn’t that worry you?”

“It would,” Randy said. “It would, maybe, but I’ve lived here my whole life, and except for that one time, it just hasn’t been a problem, and it might be years and years before anything like that happens again. And if there was a big road up to Gold Valley, now, what is that going to do? It won’t go anywhere. It’d be twenty miles out of the way for anyone to get into or out of Wardsville.”