Curds and Whey Box Set

by G M Eppers

  “You wouldn’t be lying to me.”

  Roxy crossed her heart and Badger and I showed the Boy Scout salute. As I did so, something buzzed past my ear and I saw a housefly circle a bit and land on the interrogation table. Everyone else ignored it. But knowing my mother’s recently acquired skillset, I focused on it, trying to get a closer look without getting any closer. The fly walked erratically across the tabletop for a moment, then stopped and used his tiny front legs to swipe all around his head several times. No, it wasn’t her. Just an ordinary housefly. Besides, it was much too solid, I reminded myself. If Mom was going to show in any form, it would be extremely faint. I thought it unlikely. I had shaken out the bag pretty thoroughly. Regrets nagged at me again, but I pushed them down.

  This time, when Butler looked up at the clock, he was almost drooling. “I can’t.”

  “Try harder. We can get you in solitary if we want to,” Roxy said. “Billings, start a fight.” She tilted her head toward him casually as she looked at me.

  Butler’s chair fell over and he was standing, ready to defend himself. “The guards are watching. They’ll know who started it. You’re bluffing.”

  I stood and took a step closer, looming over Butler. “I could put you in the infirmary in five seconds if I wanted to.” Yeah, I thought, and the guard would be in here in three to pull us apart. But I backed off anyway.

  Butler kept an eye on me as he bent down to pick up the chair, but because of the shackles he couldn’t reach it.

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw Badger start to get up. “I’ll get –“

  Firmly, Roxy pulled him back down. “No.”

  “But he can’t sit down.”

  “He’ll survive. Never get within arm’s reach of an inmate.”

  “He doesn’t have an arm’s reach!”

  “Sit.” She kept a hand on his arm until he relaxed and leaned back in the chair.

  Badger sent an apologetic look across the table to Butler. “I tried.”

  Butler was looking back and forth at both of us. To him, it looked like a Good Cop Bad Cop routine. He must have seen it a hundred times. His feet were not chained. Slowly, he hooked one foot around one of the legs sticking up in the air and dragged the chair toward him. He maneuvered it with small kicks a few times, then stepped on the seat to tip it upright again. “This isn’t my first rodeo.” He looked pointedly at Badger, telling us he knew it was Badger’s first rodeo, so to speak.

  “Could we get back down to business? Where were we?” I asked.

  “The counterfeiters are shopping for something,” Badger reminded me.

  I expected Butler to look back up at the clock again, but he didn’t. He was watching me. “All I can tell you is what they told me.”

  Roxy held up a finger, interrupting me before I could speak. “What who told you?”

  “They.”

  I half expected her to rush him out of frustration, despite her warning to Badger. She pretended to write in a notebook. “Subject was uncooperative. Corrective action recommended. Loss of library privileges suggested.”

  He raised an eyebrow and the resemblance made me think of Rhett Butler’s closing line. Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn. But he didn’t say it.

  I didn’t want him to clam up entirely, so I ignored his power play. “Okay, what did they tell you?” I prompted him. I’d worry about who it was later.

  His eyes locked on mine for a beat, slid over to Roxy, pointedly ignoring Badger, then came back to me. “Stall.”

  A silence fell that tried to break my eardrums. “What do you mean, stall?”

  “I was told he had unfinished business to attend to. But all they needed was a few minutes.” Somewhere in my head I heard Roxy hoot like an owl again. Unfinished business. My frontal lobe sent a block of cement into my stomach and adrenaline flooded my system. Butler was smirking. “It would appear that I am what you would call a wild goose. And you’re in the wrong nest.”

  Chapter Four

  This time it was my chair that fell over backwards. Unfinished Business. The phrase rang in my head, repeating like a mantra. I knew what he was talking about. I experienced a moment of crystal clarity that was punctuated by my pounding heartbeat. “Back to the plane. Now!”

  Without asking any questions, Badger led the way out of the room. Before the door closed behind me, I heard Butler yell, “Was it something I said?” His maniacal laugh was cut off short by the closing door.

  The guard met us as we raced toward the first locked door. He said nothing as he unlocked it for us and we raced through. He overtook us before the next door and did the same. After we cleared the first one, Roxy asked, “I don’t get it? What did he say?”

  I didn’t allow us to slow down as I told her. “Unfinished business. He didn’t understand what they meant, remember? Until he heard about my mother getting shot.” Neither of them were in the graveyard that day, and some of the details of the case had been suppressed, so I wasn’t surprised that she didn’t make the connection. Badger, I suspected, might at least have a vague idea simply because he was an information junkie. As we leapfrogged with the guard through two or three locked doorways, I explained, “that day, in the graveyard, Mom and I interrupted Junior and my Dad trying to kill Grandma. Dad thought Junior just wanted to scare her, but I’m sure he meant to kill her to create a mistrial. The case against Krochedy Senior, Roxy, remember? Grandma was on the jury.”

  Roxy, her heels clicking on the tile floor, said, “But that was more than a month ago. Senior’s trial is finished. His sentencing is in three weeks. Besides, Junior’s in prison awaiting trial of his own. He can’t hurt your grandmother.” We came to a stop in front of the last locked door between us and the exit and the guard actually dropped the keys. As he picked them up and found the right one, I said, “Don’t forget, Junior’s an idiot. He was thwarted and he’ll try again whether it means something or not.”

  “From prison? Billings, I think you’re overreacting.” The guard got that door open and Badger shouldered his way through, the locker key in his hand and poised. I turned back to Roxy as we followed him. “All those book references. You know why I made the connection? Because I read them. My grandfather owned all of them. What are the odds that the prison library has all the same books and that Butler read them, too? If we ask the librarian, I’ll bet we find an anonymous donation from Springfield, Illinois.”

  “Your grandmother helped them?”

  The process of opening the locker seemed to take a very long time. “No. My Dad. Grandma has a soft spot for him. Always has. Probably because he looks so much like me. I don’t know. But even after the attack, she can’t say no. I’m guessing he took the books, ‘borrowed’ them, he sent them to Butler, possibly with messages in them. He’s probably been orchestrating the whole counterfeiting operation to find someone good enough to make a gun.”

  “You mean buy a gun.”

  “No, make one. Out of cheese. To get past the metal detectors at the prison.”

  “To get Junior out to finish the job,” she said as her mental gears snapped together. “I’m going with you.”

  By now, Badger had his phone and was calling Miss Chiff. Being a good listener, he had heard our conversation and made a connection of his own. I heard him tell Miss Chiff to contact Dinny to set a flight plan to Springfield, Illinois. We bypassed the warden’s closed door without saying goodbye. I figured the guards would fill him in.

  We jitter walked rapidly down the tiered front steps and ran to the waiting taxi, piling into the back seat in record time. “Back to the airport,” I told him.

  During the ride, Badger did not pocket the phone. While he dialed, he said, “I think you’re right, but it still seems like a lot of trouble to go through. I don’t think someone would have to forge so many different objects to duplicate a pistol. I mean, none of them are even made of metal.” He didn’t wait for a response as he held up a finger to silence me. “Warden’s office, please. Wait, what?” He pu
shed the button for speakerphone and held it out toward us, his expression resolute.

  An alarm was blaring. People were shouting. “I’m sorry, sir,” the poor receptionist said. “You’ll have to call back. We’re going into lockdown.” She broke the connection and the phone went silent and then to a dial tone.

  “We’re too late.”

  “We don’t know that. Maybe the guards will catch them. And if we’re too late to stop the jailbreak,” I proposed, “maybe it’s not too late to save Grandma. He can’t kill her with a cheese gun. They’re going to have to find some real weapons and street clothes for Junior.”

  Roxy said, “As for the counterfeiting, there could be cases we aren’t aware of yet. I doubt we happened upon them in the right order, either. And the counterfeiters may have had a slightly different agenda. That’s the problem when you delegate work like that. I’ve seen it before. The criminals forget they are dealing with other criminals and expect them to stick to the rules. It would be just like WHEY to shop around with that in mind, especially after the ban was announced. Junior and Butte might have only been interested in a gun, but WHEY wants to saturate the market wherever they can.”

  “And don’t forget the moon rocks were heavily lacquered,” I suggested. “With enough lacquer a cheese gun could feel and look real long enough to fool prison guards, as long as they aren’t pushed into trying to fire it.”

  Roxy added, “Junior is being held in a county facility. Minimum security, plenty of visitors and staff they could take as hostages. If Junior is smart enough to take a hostage, they could walk out of there without anyone firing a shot.”

  I didn’t find that thought very comforting. I hoped the lockdown had been successful.

  I stared out the window while Roxy and Badger debated the logistics, trying to figure out how long it would take to get to Springfield. “Badger,” I said without turning my head, “keep an eye on the news feeds. That jail better not try to withhold.”

  “Oh my God,” he said, pulling the phone back out. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. Do you want to call your grandmother?”

  I wasn’t sure. If we were wrong, it would worry her unnecessarily. We were assuming the lockdown was Junior, but the receptionist hadn’t said so. It might have been a drill, come to think of it. On the other hand, if we were right and they hadn’t gotten to her house yet, she could try to protect herself. But even locking her doors wouldn’t be enough. Butte most likely still had a key. And there was that soft spot. Butte could manipulate Grandma like wet clay. “No,” I finally decided. “Call the local PD. See if they can send a patrol car there.”

  “You got it.” He worked his magic with the phone.

  Roxy put a sympathetic hand on my shoulder. “It’ll be okay.”

  It seemed to take a hundred years to get to the airport. Badger told me to go ahead and he stayed behind to pay the taxi, catching up with us later by taking a shortcut through the concourse food court. As usual, Dinny greeted us at the door to CURDS1. “Buckle in. We’re leaving immediately. Runway one left is open for the next ten minutes.”

  “You want to give me another lesson on take-offs?”

  “No offense, but no. I don’t think your mind will really be there. Hang tight. We’ll get you to Springfield as fast as we can.” She sealed the door and ran to the cockpit.

  By the time we’d gotten to our seats, the plane was beginning to roll away from the gate. After we filled in the others with what we’d learned from Butler, conversation buzzed. I glanced at McGrone, who seemed torn. He wanted to assert himself, I’m sure, and yet he couldn’t not be sympathetic to my worries. With Mr. Military exposed, he was now searching, floundering even, for a new identity. I knew I couldn’t help him with that. He’d have to learn who Samuel J. McGrone was all by himself.

  As soon as we were cruising, Dinny came out and released the cats. The flight to Springfield, Illinois would still take a couple of excruciating hours and it helped to have some entertainment. I vaguely remember petting T.B. a bit, but as Dinny had guessed, my mind was already way ahead of me. Badger crouched by me briefly to say that Springfield police had put out an APB on Junior Krochedy and to consider him armed and pungent. While they did say he was traveling with a companion, they didn’t identify the other person, not even by sex. The hostage, a laundry supervisor, they had taken to get beyond the jailhouse walls had been tossed from the car two miles out. She was treated and released for minor injuries. “Armed and pungent?” I asked.

  “They ran on foot over the septic tank. It was, um, way overdue, if you get my drift.”

  We finally landed and Roxy and I suited up in the locker room. I slung an FN Police Special Sniper Rifle over my shoulder and grabbed a spare Glock 33 and stuffed it into my mostly empty HEP belt. I didn’t know if I’d get close or not and I wanted to take them both down. Roxy hung her HEP belt over a relatively slinky mauve and gold damask gown with spaghetti straps and a split skirt that she had changed into during the flight. Most of her skirts, I noticed, were actually split. I guess they’d have to be. She also grabbed some extra ammo.

  “Billings!” Agnes shouted, clearly worried. “Take the vest and helmet, too. Please!”

  Avis was there, too, of course. “Billsy, be careful.”

  She was just trying out another nickname, but that one hit me hard. It was what she had called me in the dream, the dream where Chris Pine Capone had gunned us all down in cold blood.

  The vest and helmet were uncomfortable and clunky and made a chase difficult. Well, so did a rifle slung over my shoulder. I didn’t think Dad and Junior were going to just stand around waiting for me to shoot them, nor were they going to present their wrists for cuffs. At that thought, I saw a pair of handcuffs and tucked them into a pocket that would have held a flashlight. Roxy followed suit as I put down the rifle long enough to shrug into the CURDS Kevlar vest and plop the riot helmet on my head, strapping it securely under my chin. “The rest of you stay here,” I said as I picked up the rifle again, giving just a short glance to the empty shoulder bag lying limp at the bottom of my locker before I closed the door. They were all crammed in the doorway to the locker room to wish us well.

  I had a feeling they would be no more than five minutes behind us, but there wasn’t anything I could do about that. At the moment, I didn’t have any actual authority and McGrone wasn’t taking any authority so it was really just everyone doing what felt right. “This is between me and my Dad.”

  “They why is Roxy going?” Sylvia asked with a pout in her voice.

  “To get between me and my Dad.” Actually, Roxy was always along when an arrest seemed imminent. She was the one who would read them their Miranda rights. With any luck there would be two arrests. I was open to a run of bad luck.

  With our CURDS badges in hand, we raced down the staircase to the tarmac and headed toward the pick-up lanes where taxis would be hovering, jumping into the first one that was available. I recited my grandmother’s address and told them to step on it as Roxy and I buckled ourselves into the back seat. In the rear view, the driver saw our weaponry. “Late for a bank robbery?”

  We held up our badges. The driver looked in the mirror, then turned in his seat to get a better view. “Gotcha. Right away, sir. Cheese emergency?”

  “Something like that.”

  He stepped on the gas and pulled out into traffic, but it was still five full minutes before we exited the airport and got on the freeway. It was about five miles to Grandma’s suburban neighborhood. Roxy kept reassuring me all the way.

  Grandma lives in an elongated horseshoe shaped neighborhood off of Adlai Stevenson Drive on Sheridan Street. There are plenty of trees, several fences, and even a few swimming pools. The cab slowed as the driver peered to see house numbers. He pulled to the curb in front of the house and I jumped out. Roxy had her card ready, paid the driver and was right behind me. Two houses away, I noticed an unmarked police car with a municipal license plate on the front. The tinted windows hid t
he occupants from view. “I see them, too,” Roxy said as I rang the doorbell. Clearly, they could see our vests with the large CURDS lettering on the back, so they knew we were not attacking. I scanned the rest of the block for any suspicious activity while I waited for Grandma to open the door. I didn’t have a key. Mom had had one, and I suppose it was somewhere in her things still boxed up at HQ in D.C. Muffled, I heard Grandma’s voice. “I’m coming, I’m coming. Keep your britches on.”

  When the door opened, we pushed our way in and closed the door behind us. Roxy locked it and slid the deadbolt for good measure. “Why, Ms. DuBois. Billings! What’s going on?” As I entered, I took off my helmet and set it on the table Grandma keeps by the front door that also held her purse and keys.

  Roxy ignored the questions, and went from room to room in a security sweep, locking windows and checking closets. She finally came back to the living room. “All clear.”

  I told Grandma, “I think Dad just helped Junior break out of jail and they are coming after you again. Has he been here?”

  She appeared to think about it. “No, not today. He does stop by from time to time to borrow some of your grandfather’s books. It’s so nice to see them put to good use. They’ve just been gathering dust all these years.” She headed back to the couch where she’d been crocheting. A rolling cart held several drawers of yarn in balls and skeins, a canvas tote bag was by the side of the couch with a couple of slim crochet books and a set of those Tunisian hooks sticking out of it. A project in shades of red was on the couch. It was too crumpled for me to tell what it was. She picked it up and put it in her lap as she sat down. “He really shouldn’t hang around that Junior person. That man is a very bad influence.” She looked over her shoulder at me, still standing by the door stunned by her naiveté and indifference. “Oh, don’t worry so much, dear. The police will catch him and put Junior back where he belongs. Come, sit with me a while.” She patted the couch cushion next to her. “It’s so good to see you. Why didn’t you tell me you were coming? I could have had cookies baking.”