Jesus had always imagined himself to be more than a sleaze motel owner/manager. His ambition was to be popular, to have his name recognized by good and bad alike; to be ‘somebody.’ Being a sleuth was in his blood, because his wife’s mother’s brother had told him one time that ‘he, Jesus, was a sneaky bastard,’ and being Jesus, he took the description of his character as a compliment.
Following the blue Chevy made the manager feel good, because being a help the police seemed a worthy side occupation. It was not the first time he had been involved in police business, however, the last time, he was almost run over in the parking lot by an officer who was chasing a thief. Jesus had tried to block the path of the thief’s car, and in turn almost became part of the parking lot. The police officer threatened to put him in jail for his reckless behavior, but nothing ever came of it.
The blue Chevy picked up speed as did Jesus. A few more blocks down the street he noticed that his tenant pulled into a neighborhood and parked her pickup truck at a residence inside a gated neighborhood. The blue Chevy parked on the side of the road, and Jesus Jones found a tree not too far away where he could sit and smoke his last joint. The car’s windows were rolled up and the smell of the cheap pot filled the inside, lulling him to sleep.
A few minutes later, or so it seemed to Jesus, someone was knocking on his window, telling him to roll it down. Maude stood there, amazed to see the motel owner, his car reeking of marijuana, and his eyes glazed over.
“Mr. Motel Owner, are you following me?”
“Jesus, Jesus Jones. That’s my name. No ma’am, I wasn’t following you. I was following him,” he said, looking across the road.
“There’s no one across the road, Mr. Jones,” Maude said while leaning away from the car, trying to stay out of the smoke. “You’re about to put my eyes out. Do I need to arrest you?”
“Oh no, ma’am, I’m just trying to help.” Jesus was definitely slurring his words, taking time to pronounce each syllable correctly, but failing sadly.
“Okay,” she said. “Lock that car and I’ll give you a ride back to the motel. You’re in no shape to drive. Couldn’t you at least get some really good pot if you’re going to smoke? That stuff is foul.”
“Yes ma’am, I’m coming. Be there in a minute.”
The little man climbed into Maude’s truck, a task that would have been difficult for him, even if the truck hadn’t been parked with the driver’s side wheels in a ditch.
“Now what kind of help are you talking about?” Maude was curious. She had known many would-be detectives.
“The blue Chevy. He was following you, so I followed him, following you. He parked across the road when you went in the house.”
“Someone was following me, Mr. Jones?”
“Yes ma’am, but you can call me Jesus. Yes, the man was following you from the motel.”
“Well, don’t suppose you got a license?”
“Yes ma’am, I got it. PR7877 Arizona. Does that help?”
“We’ll see. But don’t do that again. What if he had come across the road and shot you, Jesus. What would you have done then? And don’t call me ma’am again. I know I’m old, but don’t keep reminding me.”
“No, I won’t,” the man said, blearily, falling asleep in the seat.
Maude dropped Jesus off at the motel, gave him the address where his car was parked in case he didn’t remember, and then called the Sheriff’s Office and asked Ernest to run a check on the license. She knew it would take a while, but in the meantime she was hungry, and began looking for restaurants or fast food places near the motel. It was Wednesday afternoon, and she hadn’t eaten since the evening before at Gandy’s. She still had to go to the airport, a trip that would take about fifteen minutes according to the Tylers.
Nice folks, she thought, didn’t want me to leave their house. Andrea had been very appreciative of the flowers and Bear was his usual, gentle self. She assured them that she would be fine, she was accustomed to renting a room while working, besides, it wouldn’t do to stay in a nicer room than her partner. They seemed to understand, but insisted that she come back sometime when she wasn’t working. Maude could tell they wanted to know what was going on, so she gave them the bare bones of the truth. It was the same information she had given Lilly Ann when she called her earlier.
Her niece had been very upset when she found out her friend was dead, but she promised Maude that she would keep it to herself until all family members of both victims had been notified. Maude told her that she would be making the trip to the university the next day, and that seemed to mollify her somewhat, even though she appeared to be on the brink of tears.
Joe’s 8:00 PM flight was late, but so was Maude. The burger joint where she stopped was packed with teenagers ordering burgers and shakes with loads of crisp, fried potatoes. After she finally received her order, she ate on the road to save time, although eating in the car while driving was her least favorite dining choice.
Finally, the exit door at the airport opened, and the tall, dark-haired man loped across the grounds after seeing Maude’s truck. He leaned through the driver’s window and gave her a big hug, an action that embarrassed him after the fact.
“Sorry, but I missed you, partner.”
“Ditto, Joe. Missed you too, but don’t expect you’ll want any sloppy kisses. I smell like a wet hamburger; had to eat on the road.”
“Bring me up to speed on the case, Maude. What’s happening down here that’s got you all in a tither?”
She looked at him sharply to see if he was joking before saying anything.
“It’s pretty bad. The sheriff is bunged up from a .38 caliber bullet, two people are dead by what appears to be paid assassins, and the motel owner where we’re staying wants to help out with the investigation. So far, he’s found out more than all of us put together. He followed a man that was tailing me today. The license of the car came back on a white male from Flagstaff, Arizona, deceased since three years ago. As you can see, I am not making much headway. Glad you’re here, partner.”
Joe let out a small whistle at the story. “Guess we have some work to do.”
The motel’s neon sign was flashing a vacancy when they drove up, and Joe had to go inside the office to register so Madison PD could be billed for his stay. While he was there, he assessed the owner of the business who kept looking toward the door, hoping that Maude would walk through. Joe laughed to himself, thinking that he might use that information later, but he’d best leave it alone for now.
She told Joe goodnight and went inside her room, stood in the shower, relaxing in the hot water. She dressed in flannel pajamas; thinking all the while that her last unfiltered was still coming, smoking just before bed helped keep the nightmares at bay. Sometimes her dreams kept waking her, memories of the men and women she had arrested or killed visiting her sleep. Robert Dawson sometimes came as Bobby, crying as a woeful child, the bruises on his small body bright and terrible.
Maude looked outside the window after the lights were out, gazing across the parking lot, wondering who was the driver of the blue Chevy and why was he following her? The mystery would probably right itself soon, they usually did. The thought was with her when she spotted the car parked in the far end of the lot, hidden among a group of other cars, but still visible in the light from the street.
Jumping to her feet, she pulled on jeans, boots, and a sweatshirt in the dark, called Joe on her cell phone and waited for him to answer. He spoke sleepily into the phone, but when she explained what they were about to do, he sharpened quickly, ready to go in a minute.
Slipping out of their rooms, careful that the open doors didn’t cast a large shadow in the quarter moon’s light, they met outside where Maude motioned for Joe to go to the right side, as she took the other. Hoping to surprise whoever was watching her room, she acknowledged that the treeless lot provided little cover and was going to make hiding difficult.
The gravel on the parking lot shone white in the street lights a
nd the light of the small, but bright moon, crunching under their footfalls. When they were fifty feet from the car, it began to move, slowly at first then shot out of the parking lot, the light revealing the profile of a youngish man wearing glasses. Nothing else could be told and the lack of information exacted a few expletives from Maude about the man’s heritage. She wondered again who was watching her.
Joe yawned and kicked an empty soda can on the parking lot, his disgust evident.
“Better luck next time, Partner,” he said, “If he’s determined to stalk you, he’ll be back. Wasn’t much we could do, other than shoot him.”
“Trust me Joe, I thought about doing that.”
The rest of the night was uneventful, and Maude finally fell into a fitful sleep where dirty, blue rhinos chased her across an open prairie on a pot-holed road.
Joe was asleep when his head hit the pillow, and no dreams invaded his rest, a fact that he kept to himself when Maude spoke the next morning of her restless night. For a youngster, Joe Allen had an old time prescience of what made his partner tick. They worked together well.
Jesus Jones was bitten. The fascination he had with the police was outdone by his overwhelming compulsion to protect his new idol, Maude Rogers. He rose early that Thursday morning believing he could get ahead of the driver of the blue Chevy and parked his small car across the road from his own parking lot. The air was cold in the unheated car but Jesus’ passion for duty kept him warm even as his nose ran in the cold air.
The semi-darkness of early morning wasn’t enough to hide the watcher from Jesus. The blue Chevy had parked three rows back, in the A&P parking lot, trying to stay hidden, but the sharp eyes of the motel man easily found him. Opening the door to his small Neon, Jesus continued in his stealth mission, going from car to car parked against the sidewalk, until he had cleared a city block then using his skill for tracking, the enamored man sneaked up behind the blue Chevy. He removed his cell phone with the eight megapixel camera, a possession that he went into debt to get, and proceeded to snap several pictures of the driver of the car.
The youngish man had a blonde buzz cut and round glasses that sat high on his nose, his shirt was pastel blue with a button down ivy-league collar, and a dark blue windbreaker that sat half on his shoulders. His attention was so focused on watching Maude’s room that Jesus Jones picture-taking didn’t distract him.
“You can go see Miss Maude over there, or I’m pushing the 911 button. Try to get away and they’ll nail you gringo scumbag. Why you watching her?”
“Alright, alright. I’ll go. No police. Who are you?”
“Never mind who I am. But you must be ignorant . That woman is the police.”
“Yeah, I know. Just take me to her,” The young man seemed eager to follow the instructions of his new captor.
Jesus Jones was in the middle of one of his happy dreams. He was involved in police work and on the right side of the fence. It had not always been so. There were a few times in the past when he had been on the wrong side of the law.
“What’s your name?” Jesus asked, poking the young man along on the way to Maude’s room.
“I’m not talking to you. I’ll talk to the officer, but not to you,” the driver of the blue car said.
Chapter 8
Maude heard the knock on her door and tried to ignore it, hoping whoever was there would go away. The noise continued, disturbing her sleep until she finally yelled, “Just a minute.”
She grabbed the blanket off the top of the bed and wrapped it around her shoulders, covering her pajamas, and then decided it was really unnecessary since she was fully covered and presentable. She opened the door after deciding it was Jesus Jones, and he was just about to get a taste of her wrath at being awakened so early in the morning.
The open door revealed two men standing there. One appeared to be a college boy judging by his mode of dress and short haircut.
“This better be good,” she said grumpily, on her way to the coffee pot. She plugged it into the wall socket getting ready for her first cup of the day.
“Who are you?” she asked the young man. “What do you want?”
Jones answered before the young man could say a word in his defense. “Miss Maude, this is the gringo that was watching you, the one who drives that piece of crap blue Chevy.”
“Oh yeah,” she said, “Good work, Jesus.”
“Sure, I like to help the police, especially you, Miss Maude,” he said adoringly.
Maude looked sharply at the motel owner, wondering how he ever had time to take care of his own business. She knew it was necessary to discourage him, and would, she thought, after the mystery of the young man was over.
“Alright, now that I have my coffee, I want to hear what you hoped to see following me?” she asked the young man.
“Well, it’s Jenny. Jenny Marx. I know you’re looking for her, and so am I. She’s my girlfriend back home in Flagstaff, and I came here to find her and take her home to marry me, even drove my grandmother’s car. They told me in her dorm that she was missing, and I couldn’t just sit by and wonder what happened to her.”
“Young man,” Maude said, kindly, “Do you have any identification with you. Can you prove that you’re looking for Jenny and not trying to screw up my investigation?”
“Yes ma’am. Here’s my I.D., and here’s me and Jenny when we were just kids. I just want to find her.”
“Have a seat, young man.” She looked at his driver license. “Samuel Marshall. That’s you, huh. Well Samuel, I have some bad news for you. Jenny is dead. Murdered, and I’m looking for her killers.”
The young man groaned and doubled over, holding his head, the pain of grief and surprise an overwhelming burden.
“She’s dead? Jenny’s gone? Who would have killed her, officer?”
“I don’t know, son. But you have to go back home now, and let me do my job.” Maude was never equipped to handle raw grief.
“I thought she was just out with someone else, and I wanted to find her and tell her that I love her and get her back. Why? Why would someone want to kill her? She never did anything to anybody.”
Samuel seemed to go on and on, sobbing and talking, giving Maude a headache, when all she wanted to do was go outside and light her first unfiltered for the day. Unfortunately, she was still in her pajamas.
“Okay,” she said, “I know this is hard on you, but I have work to do, and both of you need to leave. Samuel, go by the Sheriff’s Office and see Deputy Ernest Garrison. Tell him what you know, all the things you can remember that Jenny has told you since she’s been at the university. Give him your address and phone number. We’ll call you if we find out anything .Think you could do that?”
“Yes ma’am. I’ll do that.” The young man said, and slowly left the room, his head bowed from grief and sadness.
Finally, she was left alone in the room, disturbed by the early wakening. She wanted to go back to bed but it was too late. The sun was up and the day had begun. Besides, she had already had her first cup of coffee for the day. Maude thought for a while about Jesus Jones, believing that he was going to get in over his head with his amateur sleuth actions. He was fortunate that the young man had been harmless. She had to make sure that the motel owner stayed out of police business in the future.
Thirty minutes later, Maude knocked on Joe’s door with two cups of strong coffee in her hand. The detective opened the door with sleep in his eyes and took the cup from her, motioning for her to sit while he went in the bathroom. She heard him splashing into the commode and smiled to herself. They were certainly comfortable around each other.
“So, how about some breakfast?” Maude yelled through the closed door. “Meet you at the car in fifteen minutes,” she said, opening the front door, and exiting before he could acknowledge her question. He would be outside in less time than she gave him. That’s how Joe operated. He was dedicated to the job, but he was always hungry.
A half hour later, a waitress brought scrambled
eggs, bacon, and coffee to the two detectives. The last Maude had eaten was the hamburger on the way to the airport, and that was her one meal for the day. Sometimes it was that way--the job got in the way of personal needs. Usually on a case, it was grab food on the way to something else. It made for terrible digestive problems.
“Joe, help me out,” she told her partner. “This whole murder stinks of something I’m not seeing. It seems a case of brutal killing and a rape, but nothing much else. No real motive yet, no evidence. Just a couple of footprints in the mud and maybe something the medical examiner will find.”
Joe sat back with a toothpick in his mouth, enjoying the last of his coffee. “Does seem to be a weird one. No one saw anything?”
“No one’s come out with anything yet. Maybe it’s going to take a few days before the locals start talking. There’s an old man out there in a falling down cabin that probably saw something, but he can’t remember.”
“Think we can go over the M.E.’s office and find out anything?” Joe asked, wanting to help.
“Let’s go. We can always plead, ‘Ignorant out-of-town-cop, didn’t know the rules.”
The drive was a short one and it took them by the hospital.
“I want you to meet Sheriff Jack Fuller, the lawman around here. He has three deputies and a couple of guards. There are two city police officers that work for the mayor, but no police chief. It’s a law abiding place usually. No need for more cops, they tell me; these murders are a real unusual circumstance.”
The hospital was quiet in the early morning hours. Most employees were beginning their day and the patients were asleep or resting. Room 513 was Jack’s room, and if they had hoped to find him asleep, they were both surprised. The gray in his hair seemed more obvious after the stint in a hospital bed, and the lines around his unsmiling mouth were deeper. Jack’s wife Sarah was there, trying to soothe him into accepting the inevitable-that he must remain immobile for two more days.
It seemed longer than a day ago since she had seen the sheriff and it took her aback to look at him. Jack’s face was set in pain lines--he didn’t believe in painkillers for himself. Others could take them, sure, but if it was stronger than an aspirin, Jack didn’t want it in his belly or blood.
The Maude Rogers Murder Collection Page 35
