The Devil Walks in Mattingly (31 page)

We each went to our respective corners when we arrived at the office, Kate to her desk, me to mine. I watched her study her notebook through the window. Justus and his men were already out. To where and for how long was none of my concern. I was too tired. I leaned over the desk with my hand to my forehead and felt my eyes closing, thought this time maybe there was no going back, because Taylor was out there and Kate knew I’d let him go just as I’d let Justus go, and how in
the
only
way out is through, Jake, because I’m near and you’re dead. Do you understand what I
jerked my head up and rubbed my eyes, blinking the dream away.

Kate looked at me through the window. I waved her off and decided to give Bessie a workout before tackling the door. Kate said nothing when I walked past her. I rested my hat upside down on the iron bench by the back door.

There were no faces on the target that morning, just an unsteady thumping of steel against wood and a worry that the shaking in my hands made Bessie miss just as often as she flew true. Twenty minutes later a layer of sweat had replaced the sound of Phillip telling me I could never go back again.

I’d just sunk Bessie into the target again when a voice said, “Easy there.”

Kate was in the doorway when I turned. I thought she must have been the one who spoke, but she stepped aside so Trevor Morgan could walk through.

“Some people’d take that as a warning, Jake,” he said. “You thinking of me when you threw her?”

I didn’t say either way and moved down the dirt path,
smirking at the newspaperman’s fancy suit. Fresh off the rack at the JC Penny, no doubt. “What are you doing here, Trevor? Ain’t you got CNN to talk to?”

Trevor said, “I don’t want no trouble,” then smiled. “Wait, that’s your line.”

“Jake and I aren’t having what you’d call a good morning, Trevor,” Kate said. “You don’t want to make it worse.”

I freed Bessie, walked up the path, and spun, releasing her without looking. She landed square, the handle perpendicular to the ground. If I had nothing else right then, it was that Kate and Trevor had not witnessed another errant throw. I walked back and said, “State your business.”

Trevor leaned against the wall. He looked first to Kate, then to me. “Came to make peace. What peace I can, anyway.”

“That’s two people in two days who’ve sought me out for that,” I said. “Must be Christmas.”

Trevor ignored that. “We both have our duties in this town, Jake. Yours is to protect it, by force if necessary. Mine is to protect it with truth. I had to run that story.”

“The story, yes.” I wedged Bessie free. “Not the tripe on the back page. I said stick to the facts. Telling everyone Taylor Hathcock’s the devil wasn’t a fact.”

“That so?” Trevor asked. “Man blows into town leaving a trail of blood and destruction, then disappears into thin air? Leaves his partner to die out of fright? Sounds like the devil to me. What was I supposed to do, Jake?”

“Tell the truth,” Kate said. “Let it speak on its own. There’s a wide space between that and what you wrote, Trevor.”

“Maybe.” Trevor nodded. “Maybe you’re right, Kate. But I got a feeling this isn’t over. It’s like an itch deep in my ear that I can’t scratch. Been trying to figure it out. All I can come up with is that you’re hiding something, Jake.”

Kate looked at me. She kept her face stoic, but I could see the panic beneath. Panic and rage.

“Never really cared for you, Jake,” Trevor said. “You Barnetts think you own this town, always have. That’s bad enough. But you, Jake? You’re worse. All you do is leech off the people who pay your salary. You treat this job like it’s some kind of eternal vacation. I knew you’d lie down in all of this with Taylor Hathcock, but I didn’t figure you’d hide. Sure, might be because your daddy’s back in town. But there’s something else, and I’m duty bound to find out what it is.”

I passed them both, wheeled, and fired. Bessie flew, this time striking with such force that the three poles holding the target buckled. But the throw was off. I’d aimed for the center and hit the lower right edge instead, a good foot and a half from where I’d meant, and I thought of what Justus had said about a hunk of tree not striking back.

“Do what you gotta,” I said, and I made my way down the path again.

Trevor grinned. “I am. Been doing a little digging. County police might not have found anything on Taylor yet, but I have.”

I stopped. “What’d you find?”

“Not a what, a who. Taylor’s aunt. She doesn’t live in Camden anymore. Took off for West Virginia fifteen years ago. Not the sort of person who’d leave a forwarding address, if you understand me.”

Kate reached out and took hold of Trevor’s arm, a small act that only intensified the smile on his face. “How did you find her?”

“I might run a hick newspaper full of stories about crop futures and 4-H meetings, Kate, but I know what I’m doing. The other day when you two and Uncle Jimmy were gawking at Justus and wondering what in the world you were going to
do, I was on my way to the Camden post office. Postmaster there’s been handling the mail for fifty-odd years. Figured he could steer me in the right direction. Mailman always knows everybody’s business, doesn’t he?” Trevor pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and waved it in my direction. “Name’s Charlene Patterson. Lives in Parker. Just over the mountains a piece, I believe.”

“Why not give that to Alan Martin?” I asked. “Or call this lady yourself? Why are you doing this for me?”

“I’m not doing this for you, Jake. I’m doing it for Kate.”

Trevor kept the paper out. When I didn’t move, he dropped it into my hat.

“Thank you, Trevor,” Kate said.

“My pleasure.”

I thought Trevor was going to add a little extra something on the end, something along the lines of
Anytime, Kate, you ever need something, you just let me know.
But before he could, the front door flew open with such force that the handle crashed into the wall behind. The three of us looked into the foyer through the open back door. A loud voice called for help.

Kate was the first through. The stranger was a short, portly man in a wrinkled suit that hung from a pair of rounded shoulders. He stood just inside the doorway, hands shaking at his sides. His bloodshot eyes flitted about the room.

He looked at Trevor and asked, “You the sheriff?”

“I am,” I said, stepping around Trevor. “What’s the problem?”

“My daughter’s gone missing.” The man twisted his neck and blew out a series of short gasps that sounded like muffled cries. “Something’s happened. You have to come.”

Kate’s hand went to her mouth.

Trevor asked, “What’s your name, sir?”

“Seekins,” the man said. “My name is Clay Seekins. My daughter is missing.”

2

What little of the room Kate saw appeared as disjointed patterns of overturned furniture and sparkling glass, like something seen in a kaleidoscope. Faraway voices surrounded her. The lower half of Jake’s faded jeans crossed the upper portion of her vision, there for a moment and gone. Remnants of the pictures that once graced the mantel lay at her feet. Jagged shards of glass shimmered in sunlight filtered through the living room window. And there was something else, something with words, wedged into the carpet. Kate reached down to pick it up and pinched a shattered bit of glass instead. It pierced the tip of her finger, drawing blood.

Another pair of legs, thicker and shorter than her husband’s, moved from north to south along the periphery of Kate’s downward gaze. She remembered those pants belonged to Clay Seekins and this was his house, this was Lucy’s house and Lucy was gone. Clay said something—Kate couldn’t make out what it was, but it had been loud enough to pierce the fog that had rolled in around her. He moved away as another pair of suited legs arrived, these not moving past but holding still. Trevor, Kate thought, those pants belong to Trevor, he’d come to the office wearing a suit in case the networks called but that had yet to happen. Mattingly’s ills had reached only as far as Stanley and Camden. The world was full enough of bloodshed and hate; the death of a single boy didn’t seem to matter.

She heard her name called. It was nothing more than dim
static, like holding a conch shell to your ear. Kate heard her name again. She felt hands upon her shoulders. She looked up to see Trevor’s lips moving.

“What?” she asked.

“You’re bleeding,” Trevor said. He took her hand and held it up. A drop of crimson fell from Kate’s fingertip to her palm. Trevor reached for the handkerchief in his breast pocket and wrapped it around the wound. “There. You okay?”

Kate wondered why Trevor was there and then remembered he’d followed Jake. Jake had told him to stay on the porch, but Trevor had rushed inside when Kate screamed. She remembered seeing him and Jake and Lucy’s daddy and all that . . . that
destruction
.

And then, the fog.

Trevor held Kate’s bloody hand, his fingers caressing hers. She pulled away, unsure if the revulsion she felt was from what she knew had happened in the living room or if it was the wounded look of rejection on Trevor’s face. She unwrapped the handkerchief and handed it back.

“I knew there was more,” Trevor said. “Hathcock hasn’t gone anywhere. He’s still here. He
took her
.”

Old floorboards creaked above their heads. Kate looked to the ceiling and wondered when Lucy’s father and Jake had left. Trevor said it again—“He
took her
”—and Kate understood it was not so much for her benefit as his own. He’d left just enough room for her to contradict him, but she couldn’t. Trevor was right. And Kate knew it wouldn’t be long until the same newspaperman who’d found Taylor Hathcock’s long-lost Aunt Charlene would find that her husband had been lying to them all.

Clay Seekins walked down the steps. Jake trailed behind. Lucy’s daddy looked as though he wanted to panic but his
body wouldn’t allow it. His suit jacket was gone, revealing a long curve of sweat that angled down from his chest. They reached the landing and made their way into the living room, where Kate and Trevor waited.

“There’s no sign of her,” Clay said. “I came home and found it like this, Sheriff, just like this. I called for her, but she wasn’t here.”

Kate didn’t think it was possible for anyone to talk himself out of a dream (if so, she believed Jake would have done that long ago), but Lucy’s father was trying to do just that. “I’ve been away on business. Didn’t know what happened until I got back. I heard about that man and how he got away. He’s got her, doesn’t he? Sheriff? That man’s got my little girl.”

“We don’t know that, sir,” Jake said.

Trevor chuckled and shook his head. “Are you serious?”

Jake looked at him. “Thought I told you to stay on the porch.”

“I got a right to be here, Sheriff. Unless this is a crime scene, of course.” Trevor grinned, realizing he’d just set a rather nice trap. “You calling this a crime scene, Jake?”

Jake said, “No.”

Kate’s eyes bulged and caught fire. “Jake, you can’t honestly stand there and tell us this isn’t anything other than what we all know it is.”

Jake moved farther inside the room and took off his hat, rolled it in his hands. Bessie bulged from the small of his back.

“Something’s off, Kate,” he said.

“Something’s
off
?” Clay asked. He crossed the room to where I stood. “My daughter has been
taken
. Who knows how long?”

“Wait,” Trevor said. “When did you leave town, Mr. Seekins?”

“Saturday,” he said, “if that’s any of your business.”

“Sat . . .” was all Trevor got out, though Kate could guess
what he thought. Saturday had been four days ago, when Taylor and Charlie came to town. Taylor must have gotten Lucy while Jake was bringing Charlie in, maybe before Jake had even gotten to the Texaco.

Kate looked at the writing on the carpet and said, “Lucy was still here on Saturday. Sunday and Monday too. She sat with me at the meeting.”

Trevor asked, “That true, Jake?”

“I remember seeing a girl sitting with Kate, yes.”

Trevor took out his notebook and pen. His hand struggled to keep time with his thoughts. Kate didn’t think Trevor would have to worry about deciphering what he scribbled when he got back to the office. This was a story that would write itself. She only hoped the town would believe Jake had simply been wrong about Taylor being gone and not that he’d lied.

Jake moved into the kitchen and toed a pile of smashed mason jars. “You’ve occasion to find yourself up on 664 very often, Mr. Seekins?”

The man bristled. “What’s that have to do with anything?”

Jake shrugged and toed the pile more, turned to the open cabinet doors beneath the sink. “Man with a habit’s apt to keep that habit a secret. Most folk who visit Hollis Devereaux keep their jars hidden until they turn them back in. Hollis, he offers a discount if you do. Kind of funny that someone’d come in here and take your girl, but not before rooting around in the one place where you keep your empties and taking the time to smash ’em.”

Kate made her way to Jake. She remembered something Lucy had said Sunday afternoon, about the world being broken and the pieces not fitting. About her and her father getting into an argument. Lucy getting even.

“She cut her hair,” Kate said.

“It’s still on the bathroom floor upstairs,” Jake told her. Then, quieter, “You should have told me that girl’s troubles, Kate.”

She whispered back, “You should have told me some things too, Jake. She’s
gone
. It doesn’t matter what happened with her and her father, she wouldn’t run off. I was
helping
her. You kept that man near town and didn’t do a thing about it, and now everyone’s going to know.”

“What are we going to do, Sheriff?” Clay asked. “You have to find her. That killer took my daughter.”

“I don’t think that’s what happened.” Jake pointed at what was left of the mason jars first, then to the destruction in the living room. “This doesn’t look like a struggle to me. Looks more like a lashing out.”

“You’re saying Taylor Hathcock didn’t have a hand in this?” Trevor asked. He looked up from his notebook, pen poised on the paper, ready to write either way. “That it, Jake?”