“May we see him?”
“I’m sorry, but it is water-therapy time, and Mr. Dawson is not available. If you want to schedule an appointment, we can make sure he is in his room. He has never had a visitor.”
“Sorry to bother you Doctor Hopkins. We’ll be on our way. You’ve answered our questions.” Patterson said, his phobia getting the better of him. He turned and left the room, in a hurry to retrieve his weapon and leave the building.
“Thank you, Doctor, for your help. I will call and make an appointment.” Maude said.
He looked surprised for a moment, then nodded. “Here is my card. Please call me for the scheduling.”
A while later when the car was moving away from the parking lot, James Patterson apologized, but Maude told him there was no need, that they all had booger bears of one kind or another in their closets
“Are you satisfied about him now?” Patterson asked.
“I guess I am, but that means someone is using Dawson’s information.”
“For what purpose, do you think?” Patterson asked.
“I don’t know Lieutenant, but you can believe I’ll find out.” She said, guiding the car away from the grounds of the hospital.
Later, much later, after the gin bottle ran out, Maude acknowledged that she might not find the perpetrator who abducted Lilly Ann. Someone had set it up and the blonde man from the Chevy had done the work, but the person calling the shots was a mystery. The girl wouldn’t be so easy a target again, although Maude had an idea that the whole ordeal had been an elaborate game for attention, and would not be played again. She shivered a moment, thinking of how much worse it could have been.
Chapter 25
Driving was as comfortable as an old hat to Maude, especially on roads she had travelled before. She got most of her thinking done behind the wheel. Her truck was a fairly new model, with a lot of conveniences, making driving a pleasure and she used it for hauling things for her house and garden that wouldn’t fit into a car trunk. It was also good to have a carry place for equipment for work when the need arose. The trip to Houston required nothing other than her wits.
The road to Jack Fuller’s place was fairly straight and ran a 70 mph speed limit, a quick trip actually. She drove for three hours, and pulled into his driveway to find him sitting on the porch, enjoying the brief respite from the cold wet weather that had plagued the area for quite some time.
“Howdy Jack, Sarah,” Maude said, stepping onto the porch. “Nice weather, don’t blame you for sitting out.”
“Hello Maude,” Sarah said, her eyes worried. “You’ll be alright today?”
It wasn’t a reassurance, it was a question, and Sarah had just given Maude an instruction to bring her husband back the way she found him.
“Yes,” she said, “I hope so. Keep us in your prayers, Sarah.”
“I do,” she said, “All the time.”
Later, Jack was driving the county car and Maude was riding along, sipping on a cup of black coffee from a thermos.
“Good coffee. Thank Sarah, for me,” she said. “She seemed upset this morning.”
“I think she’s a little worried about the trip. She knows what we might be facing.”
“I’m glad someone knows, Jack, because I don’t have the darndest idea what we’re going to run into. Did you find out anything more from Leroy, any connection to the robbery and killing of the jewelry store owner?”
“Not much. His memory is getting shorter since he got that smart lawyer. But in my opinion, Leroy killed him with that chisel. It always bothered me-what kind of weapon would make holes in a man like that.”
“So who hired his lawyer?” Maude asked, wishing she had her second cigarette.
“Not sure, he showed up from somewhere. Said Leroy called him, but I don’t believe it. I think someone else bought his time.”
“You think they’ll try to kill him?”
“I don’t know Maude. They might, if they can get him out.”
“What about his deal with the prosecutor? That’ll go away if the lawyer tries to get the case tossed.”
“True, but our friend Leroy may not think that far ahead. I believe he is being offered bad advice from his lawyer.” Jack said. “Is it time for lunch, Maude? I could use a little bite, and a King Edward cigar.”
“I believe it is, Jack. If you’ll stop this vehicle, I believe I could eat. I need to go pee anyway.”
Jack laughed his short burst, once again surprising Maude with the brevity of his response.
Later, after nicotine and food in the order of importance, they continued on the road to Houston. Before long the outskirts of the large city came into view. They had the address for B&G, a transport company, but there was no information on the net.
Remembering the message from Harry about the company being connected to the Mob, Jack drove very carefully to the address on the GPS. He found a place to park around the corner of the block, on a cross-street, and proceeded to get out of the vehicle.
“Maude, we got no jurisdiction here. This is Harris County, so anything goes down, we got to call them. Right?”
“Right,” she said, agreeing with his assessment, but at the same time, making sure her weapon and extra magazine were full of ammunition.
“It’s my thought to find out what we can, as quickly as possible, without getting our butts shot off.” Jack said, checking his own weapon. “I assume you wore your vest?”
“Oh heck yeah, you attract bullets. I came prepared.” She said, looking for a way to get to the cinder block building then get inside.
There were two black Mercedes sports cars parked at the back of the small building, and an older model Chrysler sat alongside them. From what Maude could see, the loading dock was also behind the building, and one of the white vans was parked off to the side of it. A newer brown van was backed up to the dock, its doors thrown open in process of being unloaded.
Maude motioned to Jack that she would approach the dock from the side, hoping to get there unseen. She had dressed appropriately in all black, hoping to blend in with dark interiors. From what she could see, the lights were on in one room, but the rest of the building was dark. On the loading dock, sealed packing boxes the size of copy paper reams were stacked in rows. She sidled up to the dock and climbed, her knees aching from the effort as she reached the top and sat down. Pulling one of the heavy boxes from the stack toward her, Maude looked it over for an opening.
The seal on the cardboard was done with several pieces of corded packing tape, the type that packagers use to protect expensive goods. Maude pulled a knife from her pocket and split the box top, just enough to peek inside. She looked twice before glancing at Jack over against the other side of the dock and shrugged at the contents.
Jack was huffing from the effort of pulling himself to the top of the loading dock, his sore shoulder aching with the effort. Maude motioned to him to look at the box she had opened. Inside were textbooks, old ones mostly, the kind that universities send out to archivists, and for recycling.
“Jack,” she whispered. “These are books. They’re shipping books.”
Jack nodded he understood and lifted his eyebrows toward the dark interior of the warehouse. They both heard voices from inside the building. Two dock workers were returning to pick up the rest of the boxes they had offloaded. On impulse, Maude reached into the open box and removed one of the books, quickly closing it afterward. She put another box on top of the opened one and then rolled over, concealing her frame behind a forklift, the book tucked safely under her right arm. It was at those times that Maude Rogers was glad she was skinny.
Jack scooted off the dock, hiding behind a stack of pallets, his considerable bulk moving faster than even he thought was possible. He saw Maude and gave her the okay sign, hoping she was concealed also. Maude could see the dockworkers plainly, and she knew they were not minimum-wage loaders. Both workers had weapons on their belts, an indication that books were not the only thing being unloaded.
>
Maude knew they had no search warrant for the items on the dock, nor could they burst into the warehouse without some evidence of wrong doing on the part of the business owners. She waited until the two left, then moved quickly from her position to the ground, groaning as her boots hit the gravel.
“Jack, let’s get out of here while we can. We need a search warrant for this place.”
The sheriff nodded and agreed, leading the way back to his car parked around the corner of the block.
“There’s skullduggery going on here.” Jack said when they got to the car.
“Amen to that, and get us out of here before we get caught.”
Jack drove the car away a safe distance and slowed at Maude’s request.
“I need a cigarette, she said. I’m due one. Besides, I want to see what’s so important about an old book.”
A coffee shop was two blocks ahead and Jack pulled into it and parked the car.
“Let’s go,” he said, “I’m buying.”
She took the book with her, looking it over, not understanding why it was valuable. From the cover the edition didn’t seem to be old enough to be considered a rare book. She was puzzled but got her coffee and sat down, the urge for a cigarette subsiding with her lowered blood pressure.
“What kind of book is it Maude?” Jack asked.
“Let’s see,” she said, taking the tape off the outside of the cover. “They don’t usually tape these things do they?”
She picked up coffee with one hand and opened the book with the other, then quickly closed it, looking around at the rest of the people in the coffee shop.
“Jack,” she whispered, “let’s go, we have to get off this street, out of the area.”
Jack Fuller was no fool. He had been round the bend an back again more than once, and when he heard panic in Maude’s voice, he moved quickly to the car, started it and drove away, taking a cross street to get away from the main road from the warehouse. He didn’t know what kind of book it was that Maude was holding, but he knew for sure she was sincere about leaving.
Finally Jack got to a place where he could stop, and pulled into a small park, next to a live oak tree.
“Okay. Let’s see it.” He said.
Maude handed it over, careful to keep the cover upright, and watched Jack open the book. She observed his expression at seeing the opening made by the hollowed out pages. A rectangular 4” by 6” hole, about two inches deep, was cloth lined, and filled with plastic bags containing small yellow pills.
“Holy Crap!” Jack exclaimed. “What do we have here?”
“From all those little designs on them, I’d say that we have us a book full of MDMA, street named Ecstasy, E, X, or XTC, and if my guess is correct, there were crates of those boxes being unloaded into that warehouse. That was the reason for the guns.”
“Maude what are we into? You think Leroy had something to do with this?”
“No, I don’t think so. I’ve been kicking this around; hear me out and tell me what you think, Jack. This B&G Company transports what they profess to be old, used university books, but they are really hollowed out shells of books full of bags of MDMA. So where did they come from? I think a university science lab would be a likely choice. How am I doing?”
“Makes sense, go on.”
“Let’s say that we know of a university where a chemistry student was just raped and killed while on vacation.”
“What if that student was running instead?” Jack chimed in.
“Maybe she saw something, or was a part of something and got greedy. Remember, Jenny had changed her major from English to Chemistry. An unusual switch, but the professor said Jenny was brilliant. Maybe the girl needed money for school. Someone wanted to make an example of her, thus the rape, and then scalping her. Remember, Leroy said he photographed the girl after the murder. Whoever set this up wanted to send a message. What better way to control your coconspirators? Screw up-this is what we do to you.”
“The doctor could have been in on it, came up with the formula for a super- powered drug, them marketed it to the Mob.” Jack was definitely thinking.
“You would need someone to set all that up, someone on campus to oversee, to coordinate the sale; collect the money. You would need a protector at the university, someone with huge amounts of clout, an administrator.” Maude was thinking of some of the professors she had met.
“Jack, we have to call in the DEA. They can storm B&G before they have a chance to shut it down.”
“Maude, you and I have to go to the university, find the lab where they make this stuff. They’ll start house cleaning once those men from the dock put out the word that someone stole some of the merchandise.”
“My gosh, Jack, what if they’re all in on it--the chemistry professor, the laboratory professors? Some would have to be, wouldn’t they?” She thought some more, watching the road as Jack drove. “Those guys on the dock, they might not remember if one of the boxes was unsealed when they off-loaded, but when the count is done, they will know someone took part of the shipment. We may still have a little time, but it won’t take long before someone at the university is on the carpet for the theft.”
“Do you have any friends in the DEA?” Maude asked.
“As a matter of fact I do,” Jack said, picking up his phone from the car seat.
The university campus was busy; the dorms getting ready to close for the Christmas holidays were in a state of cleaning as students loaded personal items into cars and trucks.
“Jack, remember when you were that young?”
“No Maude, I don’t. Seems I’ve been old all my life.”
She looked at him to see if he was joking, but his jaw was set in a firm line. She wondered about the remark, but knew if he wanted to talk about it he would in his time. They had discussed a plan after Jack had called his DEA friend, told them what article they had in their possession. The friend was one who had worked with Jack years earlier on the Machito Gomez drug bust, and knew Jack to be a straight up lawman who wouldn’t steer him wrong. He told Jack they would get on it.
The plan was to enter the campus and go to the science lab directly, bypassing the administration building. It was after 4:00 P.M. and some of the professors had already gone home, but the science building and lab had cars in the slots around it. Maude could see people coming and going from the building, just as it had been the last trip she had made there. She wondered just how many people were involved in the preparation of the little pills.
Jack was huffing and puffing from the exertion of the walk across campus, but he never faltered. He was too intent on doing his job. The university was a public place with no expectation of privacy for the criminals. They could lock the doors to keep the law officers out for a while, but Jack and Maude had planned for that. They were going to push beyond any stall tactics the criminals tried to use before the doors to the lab could be locked.
Maude couldn’t remember any time she had entered a university building armed, but it was happening today. There was no time to call in other people to help, not after spotting one of the white B&G vans at the dock. The driver would be loading the boxes of product, or delivering the empties for refills.
The receptionist at the desk was packing her bag to leave for the day as Maude and Jack burst through the door. She tried to say something, but Maude stared at her, and the girl closed her mouth and sat down, white faced with fear. She remembered Maude from the last trip, and wanted nothing more than to stay out that lady’s way.
The large, double doors leading from the main entry to the science building constantly opened and closed, allowing people to leave. The melee of the departing crowd of students created a traffic block, and Maude had to step back momentarily to allow the students to pass. Quickly she recognized one of the professors walking with break-neck speed down the corridor, in the opposite direction.
“Going somewhere, Professor Bledsoe?” Maude yelled, catching the woman in mid-step.
The dumpy w
oman began running, as fast as she could toward the rear of the building.
“Oh, why do they always run?” Maude asked. Her knees were rebelling at the pace she had set. She got near Bledsoe and grabbed her arm, causing both of them to fall against a group of students leaving the classroom from across the hall. Bledsoe disengaged, and began running again, her high heels clicking against the tile floor.
“Oh hell,” Maude said, catching up with the professor. “Now look, Bledsoe,” she barked. “You’ve made me start cussing.” Without further ado, she tackled the hysterically crying woman who was still trying to get away. “Sit down, you’re caught,” Maude ordered.
Professor Bledsoe was behaving badly and she knew it. He had warned her to be on her guard, but it didn’t matter when it came down to it. She was caught, and nothing good was ever going to happen to her again.
“Where is he, Paula?” Maude said, putting her cuffs on the woman.
“Who do you mean?” the crying woman asked.
“Your boss. It’s over, Paula. As they say in the movies, the gig is up.”
Bledsoe started wailing, out of control. Maude took the woman’s face in her hands and looked directly into her eyes. “Paula, I know you didn’t have to do with killing those two, but in the eyes of the law, you’re guilty of it all the same. If you want to help yourself, start talking, before it’s too late.”
“I…I didn’t have anything to do with the girl or Aaron, I just needed the money, and he said we wouldn’t get caught. But she…wanted more, and threatened to tell, to get immunity. So he had her killed. Poor Aaron, he was never part of it.” With that, the woman broke down again, and Maude cuffed her to the desk in the chemistry classroom. It seemed fitting to Maude that the woman was tied to her work.
She started to leave, and turned back, “Where is Frank Carmody?”
“Who?” Bledsoe asked, searching Maude’s face with a puzzled look.
Suddenly the picture cleared, and her questions were answered. “Carmody is not part of this. We’re after Dean Stone, aren’t we?”
The Maude Rogers Murder Collection Page 51
