The Traveling Corpse (25 page)

“If they can't find anything incriminating,
does he get his cart back?”

“Yes, but he has to go get it at his own
expense,” Menendez explained.

“That's a bummer, especially if you're
innocent,” Annie said. “However, we're sure he's
not
innocent, but we haven't yet been able to prove that he's had
Twila's body on his cart and probably more than once. I do hope we
… you … can prove it.”

“These things can take time,” the sergeant
replied. “We solve most cases, eventually.”

An hour passed. Art's stomach growled. Annie
heard it and looked at him, concerned about the level of his blood
sugar. “I'm okay,” he assured her, pulling out a little wrapped
package of cheese cracker sandwiches. “Want some?” She did, but she
shook her head. Art was on the edge of being diabetic; she knew he
needed some food more than she did.

The Vigeauxs drove up. “Listened to your
message when we got home. Thanks, Brad, for calling us,” Von said
as he joined them at the fence.

“Do you know where the Davises are today? I
left them a message too.”

“I think they were going to visit somebody in
Lakeland,” Verna offered, “taking his aunt out for brunch.”

“Oh, I think you're right,” Barb confirmed.
“Well, we are glad you two are here. We need your sharp eyes,
Verna. Look over there.” Barb pointed at the emu. “See! There's
something in that emu's mouth. I named her Carol. She seems so
happy with whatever's in her beak, carries it around everywhere she
goes like a little kid. Hasn't put it down for over an hour that
we've been watching. It's like she's showing it off to her girl
friends!”

Verna squinted, “She too far away for me to
see what it is. But you're right; it does look like jewelry. This
could be important.”

Menendez agreed about its importance. She had
decided that she needed to stay here and keep this emu under
observation more than she needed to sit off the by-pass watching
for speeders. She'd had worse duties, she thought. The weather was
pleasant with the temperature in the high 70s and there was little
humidity; it was a delightful late January day. There was cloud
cover; so the chance of getting sun-burned was reduced, but the
possibility was still there. Annie offered her a tube of
sun-screen; Maria Menendez smiled her thanks and squeezed out some
crème to rub on her pretty face.

 

* * *

 

Joe Juarez arrived just before the farmer.
Gerald Gilbert drove into the field in his dented blue pick-up
truck. Gilly was still wearing his Buccaneer ball cap when he slid
out of the cab and met them on the other side of the fence. Sgt.
Menendez pointed out the emu with the shiny bauble in its beak,
saying, “We'd like to have a look at that thing in its mouth. Can
you get it for us? While we were waiting for you, Mrs. Bradkowski
named her, calls her Carol after some singer.”

The seniors all looked at each other in
distress when Menendez called Carol Channing ‘some singer.' It made
them feel very old. They realized that the Sergeant was simply too
young to remember this famous entertainer who was no longer in the
public eye.

Gilly didn't seem to know who Carol Channing
was either. He took the toothpick out of his mouth and answered
Menendez, “Shouldn't be no problem, m'am. Brought their feed. That
should do it.”

Barb interrupted, “I heard that raising these
big birds was a school project of the FAA. Why aren't the student
farmers feeding them?'

“Well, m'am, it started out as a school club
project, but that ended a couple of months ago. Can't make no money
selling the meat; costs too much, more than beef. Not many people
willing to buy.”

Barb said, “It's supposed to be low in
cholesterol.”

“Yes, m'am; an' it's tasty, too, but it jest
costs too much ta make any real money. Tha only ones who got rich
off ostriches were them who sold tha fertile eggs, tha ones who got
in tha pyramid game early.”

“What are you going to do with them?” Annie
asked.

“So far I'm jest keepin' ‘em as pets,” Gilly
answered, “but with tha cost of feed, an' all, I'll probably take
‘em to tha county fair an' sell ‘em at auction. Kinda hate to get
rid of ‘em; I'm kinda attached to tha ugly critters, ‘cept that big
ole male. After what he done tha other night, I don't mind tellin'
ya; he'll be tha first one I sell off. First one.”

Joe Juarez replied, “Can't say as I blame you
for that. After I saw how fast he was and how powerful, I can tell
you that I'm not ashamed to say that bird worries me. And I'm not
afraid of most things or else I would never have become a deputy.
When that bird kicked Jiggs, he never even reared back with his
leg; he just swung it forward and ripped that guy's chest wide
open.”

“I've heard that the power in an ostrich's
kick is 250 pounds. 250 pounds! Don't believe I wantta find out fer
myself!” Gilly chuckled. Then he explained, “I was ‘bout ta leave
ta come over here ta feed ‘em when your Dispatcher called me. I'm
late getting ‘round ta feedin' ‘em this mornin'. First thing I had
ta do taday was ta make a service call on a golf cart. Got me a
little golf cart service business ta keep me busy along with
farmin'. He pulled out some slightly bruised business cards from
the back pocket of his jeans. As he passed them out, he said. “Some
kids swiped a golf cart from a carport last night. Took it out fer
a joy ride, then tipped it on its side. Most of tha acid ran outta
tha battery.”

Art asked, “Was that in BradLee?”

“Naw. Another park. But, that's why I'm late
gettin' here ta feed ‘em. Wish I could feed ‘em in the evening when
it's cooler—‘specially durin' tha awful heat of summer—but that
won't work. The pellets get moist if they're left overnight. Them
birds won't so much as eat a bite of it if it's moist. Then it's
jest a waste of food.”

They stood at the fence and watched Gilly go
to the bed of his truck and open a 50 pound bag of feed. Using an
old two-pound coffee can as a scoop, he emptied the feed, which
he'd told them was heavy on protein, 20%, plus soy, alfalfa, corn
and a few other ingredients into one of the big, black, heavy
rubber bowls that was about eighteen inches in diameter and some
five inches deep. Each bird had a dish, and Gilly filled them all.
The big birds, including Carol, crowded around the bowls and began
to eat. Gilly bent over, using his bandana-print blue handkerchief
he picked something up from the ground. He walked over to the fence
and asked Menendez, “This what yer lookin' fer?”

As she reached for it, Menendez signaled
Juarez to move the gawking golfers away from the fence and out of
hearing. She unwrapped it and held the contents in her open hand
for the others to see. “Recognize it?”

There was no heart charm dangling from it,
but it was a gold bracelet. Verna examined it carefully and
exclaimed, “This is beautiful and very unusual. It's a bracelet,
but it's also a watch. Look, there's a tiny hinge here. May I?” she
looked up at Menendez, who nodded agreement. Using just her
fingernail, Verna gently lifted the cover that protected the face
of the watch hidden under it. Menendez noted that the hands were
stopped at 9:47.

“That's it! That's the 50th anniversary watch
that the Tuckman's told us about,” Annie almost yelled in her
excitement. “Sergeant, Twila's brother, Tony, told us that Twila
inherited a gold bracelet watch from her mother when she died. It
was their mother's 50th anniversary gift from their father. Tony
was hoping he could get it back; he wanted to give it to Tilley and
then to their daughter. It is very special.”

“If we weren't lucky enough to find that
charm bracelet with the heart on it, at least, we are verah lucky
to find this. Surely we can trace this right straight to Twila,”
Verna predicted.

“You're right!” Barb chimed in. “Tilley
described it to us. Remember, she told us that it had some
diamond-cut gold links in it? Even though it's been outside in the
rain and in that bird's mouth, it still reflects light like there
were diamonds in the wrist band.”

Menendez kept her own counsel and listened to
‘her seniors' reasoning.

“It isn't running; it's stopped at 9:47,”
Brad added. “That's about the time Karl drove out of the field,
right after Jiggs was kicked to death. Do you suppose he ran over
her and her watch?”

“That's a very good supposition,” his wife
said. “Then, again, it might be that rain got in it.”

“But,” Brad argued, “if you remember, it
didn't start raining until a little later Thursday night.”

“You're right about the time it began
raining,” Barb conceded.

“Since the clasp is open,” Annie interjected,
“I think it fell off her arm, probably when the body fell off the
golf cart, or when it ran over her.”

“Then why didn't we find the watch before?
Like when Verna found the blue threads caught in that plant? Where
was it all day Friday?” Barb asked.

Gilly answered that question, “Most likely
inside one of tha big birds.”

Barb shuddered, “You mean …?”

“Yep. They graze all day long. One of ‘em,
probably swallowed it; then passed it.”

“Wouldn't it be hidden inside the, the poop?”
Barb finally managed to say the word.

“Naw, they mostly just pass everythin' out
along with their liquid-like stuff. We never have ta clean up their
manure like ya do cows. Sometimes there's a little ball of doo-doo,
but it's no more than three-quarter of an inch ‘round; so, no, that
fancy watch wouldn't be hidden in it. Not big enough ta hide that.”
He motioned to the bracelet watch. “Naw, it would jest come out an'
lay thar on tha ground. If that watch fell off on Thursday night,
then it was most prob'bly in one of their stomachs all day long
Friday. Then this little emu, Carol, ya call her, picked it up
today an' she's been showin' it off ta her buddies.”

Annie thought that what Gilly said made sense
about the jewelry being swallowed and passed, but where was Twila's
body? There was no way a bird swallowed her too. She looked away,
trying to puzzle through the whole problem. She saw the alligator
sunning itself on the bank. “That's it!” she exclaimed. “He could
be the answer.”

“What are you talking about, Annie? The
answer to what?” her husband asked. He was used to her talking
about something and forgetting to tell him the subject.

Annie pointed, “That alligator; he could have
eaten the corpse and that's why we can't find the body. I knew
there had to be a reason why we couldn't find Twila.”

Verna shuddered this time, “Oh, Annie, you
don't think that alligatah ate Twila? Do you?”

“Why not? They eat everything else.” She
turned to Gilly and asked, “Will an alligator eat meat that's been
dead for a couple of days?”

“They're not too choosy as far as I know,
m'am. Meat is meat to them.” Gilly said.

“Look who's coming,” Barb said, pointing to
the cart path. Doc and DeeDee Davis pulled up to next to their
friends. Then Barb, taking charge, explained what had happened so
far that day. Amused by Barb's authority, Menendez stood by,
listening carefully.

Then Annie analyzed the problem. “Let's say
that the body fell off Karl's golf cart when he was in a hurry to
get out of here on Thursday night. He coulda made a fast turn, and
it coulda fallen off his cart if he didn't have it strapped on. We
couldn't get in here to check it out last night because of the mad
ostrich, and it was too dark to see all of the field.”

Art added, “What about this idea? Karl knows
he can't bury the body after what happened to Jiggs; that plan's
gone. Maybe the body didn't fall off; maybe he pushed it off close
to the pond hoping the alligator would take it away. Remember, Karl
was desperate at that point. If the alligator eats the body,
there's no evidence, and he's scot-free!”

Verna added, “And that's when Twila's blue
pants snagged on that thorny bush near the pond.”

“An' tha clasp of her watch could've opened,
an' it fell off her wrist. And one of those big birds could've
swallowed it and had it inside her all day until she pooped. Then
Carol, that cute little emu, couldda picked it up this mornin',”
DeeDee continued the reasoning.

“I wish the first one had showed it
off—strutted around with it—instead of swallowing it. It would have
saved us a whole day,” Annie lamented.

“Since we had that fairly rare American
crocodile in one of our ponds,” Doc said, “I did some research on
them and while I was at it, I read up on alligators too. You
realize, of course, that I didn't have much need to know a lot
about alligators and crocodiles in my veterinarian practice back in
mid-Ohio.”

His friends chuckled, and he continued,
“Alligators don't eat when it's cold, but since it warmed up
Thursday, he could have been hungry. If that body was there by the
pond, then he had an easy meal just waiting for him. I don't think
he ate the body on the land. But then, he could have. However, if
he had it in the water, he'd have grabbed a limb and then spun in a
death roll, tearing the arm from the corpse. Then he'd swallow it.
Alligators don't have chewing teeth; they swallow things
whole—arms, jewelry and all.

DeeDee interjected, “Ya do paint quite a
gruesome picture, Doc!”

“Well, I thought you'd want to know all the
gory details.”