Mortal Remains in Maggody

by Joan Hess

  (beat)

  And you got to get a message to Billy Joe telling him where I am.

  A calculating expression comes over Pipkin’s face. He rubs his palms together.

  PIPKIN

  And what’s in it for me, Loretta? I ain’t gonna risk havin’ Cooter after me for nuthin’. If I let you hide in the choir room, you got to make it worth my while.

  LORETTA

  I ain’t got no money.

  PIPKIN

  I ain’t talkin’ about money. I reckon I’m talkin’ about that cot in the choir room. Is you comin’?

  CAMERA CLOSEUP of Loretta’s face as she realizes what he’s talking about. Desperation is replaced by resignation as CAMERA WIDENS and she rises.

  LORETTA

  And you a man of the cloth …

  PIPKIN

  That’s why I keep a sheet on that little cot. Close enough.

  CUT TO:

  I was burrowing in my bed and doing my best to wrap the sheets around myself tightly enough to interfere with my circulation. The ringing of the telephone was almost welcome, although it took me a minute to untangle myself and flop across the far side of the bed to grab the receiver. As I mumbled hello, I glanced at the alarm clock. It was a few minutes shy of midnight.

  “Arly, this is Wade, Wade Elkins. We’ve got trouble.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “A fire at the gas station in Hasty. I have to get back there; I just wanted to let you know. Sheriff’s on his way.”

  He hung up before I could ask any questions, but from his panicky tone I realized whatever was happening was damn serious. I pulled on the nearest clothes, ran a comb through my hair and pulled it into a tight ponytail, and ran down the outside stairs and across the road to my car. My gun was inside the PD. I couldn’t think of a reason why I’d need it, but I went inside and strapped it on, because, I regret to admit, I could think of reasons why I’d like to use it. I hurried back to the car, hopped in, and turned the key.

  Silence.

  “Damn it!” I said as I turned the key more tightly and willed the car to start. I might as well have willed it to produce rotors on its roof so I could hover over Hasty. I’d been telling the town council for over a year that I needed a dependable vehicle, and for over a year I’d been met with whines about the budget and promises, never meant to be taken seriously, that allowed us to end the meetings in a spirit of levity.

  I couldn’t call Wade back. Maggody was dark; not one window was lit, nor did so much as a chicken truck breach the blankness of the road. I ran down the pavement, through the Ruby Bee’s Bar & Grill parking lot, and headed for #1. And crashed into a warm body that grabbed me by the arms and barked, à la drill sergeant, “Where do you think you’re going?”

  For a wild moment, I wondered if I was in the clutches of the maniac who’d murdered Kitty Kaye. I was struggling to free myself when I remembered the guard whose presence I personally, stridently, and at length had demanded. “It’s Arly Hanks,” I said between gasps. “Chief of Police Hanks.”

  My arms were released, and the man stepped back to appraise me in the gloomy darkness. “Sorry, Chief, you about scared the skin off me. Why in thunderation are you dashing around like this?”

  “I need a car. Mine won’t start. I’m going to borrow my mother’s, and she lives in that first unit.”

  “Can’t see anything wrong with that,” he began, but I missed the rest of it as I hurried to Ruby Bee’s door and pounded on it loudly enough to rouse everyone within a mile or so, including those in fancy pastel boxes out behind the Methodist church and six feet under.

  It took Ruby Bee a good while to answer the door, and when she did, she wore a robe and slippers. Her face was slathered with cream, and the fat pink rollers on her head were hidden under a plastic shower cap. “Arly?” she said querulously. “Land sakes, what time is it?”

  “I don’t have time to field questions. I need the key to your car.”

  “It seems awful late for you to be galloping off like this. You might have taken more time with your hair and face. That T-shirt’s all stretched out of shape, and those pants are just plain baggy. Maybe you ought to go home and put on something—”

  “The key, Ruby Bee. It’s official police business, and it’s an emergency.”

  “Well, I never,” she grumbled as she went to her purse and took out her key chain. “I’d like to think there’ll be some gas left when you bring it back. Estelle and I are planning to run over to—”

  I snatched the keys out of her hand, pulled the door shut, and got into her car. The trooper saluted me as I drove past him, but I was too frazzled to return the professional courtesy. I turned left and headed for the county road to Hasty, replaying Wade’s terse message in my mind. The only gas station in Hasty was across the street from Willard Yarrow’s house. A peculiar coincidence, if that’s all it was. Gasoline was certainly flammable (or inflammable, if you prefer), so a fire was not unthinkable. Still, we had Billy Dick’s playmate and a fire in close proximity.

  As this mental debate raged on, I realized I was driving more and more slowly, until I was virtually crawling between the rows of dark buildings and the sporadic streetlights, some of which worked. There was no reason why I needed to rush to the fire; I was trained for nothing more useful than crowd control, and Harve and his men would be there by now.

  I reached a decision before the car came to a complete halt. Billy Dick MacNamara might be sound asleep in his bed, dreaming of sugarplums, with his mother there to swear he hadn’t left the house since supper. Or he might not be.

  As I drove up his driveway, I noted that the house was dark. A truck was parked in the yard, however, and as I pulled in next to it, my (Ruby Bee’s) headlights flashed on two figures sitting on the top step of the porch. I cut off the lights, took a deep breath, and got out of the car.

  “I want to talk to you,” I said as I approached them.

  “Fine night, ain’t it?” Billy Dick said. “We’re j-just sitting here admiring the moon.” Beside him, Willard was motionless; for all I knew, he could have been unconscious and propped up next to him like a cardboard silhouette.

  “How long have you been admiring the moon?”

  “Couldn’t say. You know, when the moon rose a while back, it was real big and this fierce, hot orange color. It looked like a demonic jack-o’-lantern, but only till it cleared the trees. Now it’s real pretty.”

  I stepped in front of his companion. “How long have you been here, Willard?”

  “Since dark, I reckon,” he said uncertainly.

  “Have you found your way out of the dungeon?” I asked him.

  Billy Dick leaned forward and in a whisper said, “Xardak the Wizard was real sure he could sneak by the dragon, but he made a bad decision and the next thing he knew, he was nothing but a crispy critter.”

  They both began to giggle. The noise was foul, almost pornographic, and I had to order myself not to get back in the car and leave them to their games and dark fantasies. Instead, I went to the truck and put my hand on the hood.

  “The engine’s hot,” I said. “If you’ve been sitting here for hours, who was driving it in the past few minutes?”

  “It’s always hot,” said Billy Dick. “Sometimes it gets so hot that I’m afraid it’ll burst into flames. Is that what happened to your car, Chief Hanks? Did it burst into flames, with clouds of black smoke pouring up from it to fill the sky until you couldn’t hardly breathe? Or did it explode like someone had put a stick of dynamite under the hood?”

  “Why do you think something happened to my car?” I asked evenly, not allowing myself to admit how much he was unnerving me. Had he done something to my car? Was he implying he would? I didn’t care for either.

  “I just noticed you weren’t driving your official police car with the blue light,” he said. I couldn’t see his face well, but I could hear his smirk perfectly. “I guess you need the lights when you’re in a hurry.”

  “I’m i
n no hurry,” I said. “You’re claiming you’ve been here since dark and the truck overheated while parked in this spot, right?”

  Billy Dick took a drink from a can as he elaborately scratched his head. “Maybe it’s some kind of spontaneous combustion, where something gets hotter and hotter until it goes up in flames. Don’t stand too close to it, Chief Hanks. It might get too hot for you to handle. You might get burned.”

  “And be careful with your own car,” Willard said. “This spontaneous-combustion stuff could be contagious.”

  I realized I was gripping my gun, and I uncurled my fingers. Ignoring what we all knew were threats, I said, “Then neither one of you was in Hasty tonight? You don’t know anything about a fire at the gas station?”

  “How could we?” Billy Dick abruptly grabbed Willard’s arm and yanked him up. “Hey, I think we should go over there and take a look, don’t you? Those gas tanks might put on a real pyrotechnical display.”

  “Sure, Billy Dick,” the younger boy said. He was trying to display the same level of bravado, but I sensed he was frightened. “Maybe it’s burning my house down, too. Boy, that’d piss Pa off.”

  “But Willard, isn’t there some guy who works there at night? You think he might have been in the station when the fire started?”

  “Gee, Billy Dick, I don’t know, but I hope not. If the doors got jammed, he may be up shit creek.”

  “Or on his way to hell,” Billy Dick countered cheerfully. “See you later, Chief Hanks.” As I stared at them, they walked past me, got in the truck, slammed doors, and drove away.

  I waited until the taillights disappeared, then sat on the fender of my (Ruby Bee’s) car and mulled over what they’d said, what they’d implied, and what I could do with it. Not a blasted thing, I concluded. If I tried to nail them on the basis of the hot engine, they’d remember that they went to the Dee-Lishus for drinks or took a drive in the country, and I’d be hard pressed to prove otherwise. The rest of it could be written off as paranoia on my part.

  I was very glad I didn’t work at a gas station in Hasty, I told myself as it began to sprinkle. I stayed where I was until rain was beating down on me like frozen bullets and I could barely make out the dark house and vacated porch step.

  “Kevin Fitzgerald Buchanon, you’re as good as dead! I hope you know that,” Dahlia said, her face beet red with anger. In the splotchy moonlight he could see her fists, which were the size of softballs and clearly poised for contact. “You’re more useless than a dog without a flea,” she continued, moving past the car door. “If I get my hands around that scrawny neck of yours, you’re gonna regret the day you was born. I’ll bet your ma did right there in the delivery room!”

  Kevin sidled around the car, keeping it between them and prepared to do so all night, or until his honey bunny calmed down, which wasn’t looking like it would happen real soon. An owl screeched somewhere in the woods; the noise startled him, but not enough to make him look away from the avowed murderess with the burning eyes and ominous fists.

  “Now, sweetums,” he begged, easing around the trunk as she advanced, “I told you how I did what I had to do. I couldn’t let those people woo you into going to Hollywood. I love you too much for that.” He smiled hopefully at her, but he kept moving, nevertheless.

  “You love me so much that you kidnap me by bringing me up here, driving so fast I’m feared to jump out, and then rip that wire out of the car so we’re stuck?” She took a step. “It’s as plain as the nose on my face that you’re nothin’ but a jealous, low-down, lyin’ sumbitch, and a sight meaner than a two-headed snake. If I don’t get to be in the movie, I aim to rearrange your face so your kinfolk won’t recognize you!” She took another step, but so did he, and she figured she wouldn’t have much success lungin’ across the hood. Lungin’ was not one of her fortes. “You find that wire this very minute and fix this car, and I mean it.”

  “I threw it as hard as I could out yonder in the bushes,” Kevin said, whimpering. “There ain’t no way I can find it in the dark.”

  “If you find it in the morning, can you put it back where it goes and get me to town?”

  Kevin crossed his fingers, in that car repairin’ was not one of his fortes. “Of course I can, my beloved. I’m truly sorry I did what I did, and I promise I’ll never do anything like this again. My brain just kinda snapped, and all of a sudden I was feeling like I’d drunk a quart of field whiskey and didn’t know what I was doing. Kin you forgive me?” He considered getting down on his knees, but he couldn’t risk giving her an advantage.

  Dahlia stopped puffing and stared at him. “The only way I’ll forgive you is if I’m in the movie tomorrow. If I’m not, you can kiss your ugly face good-bye forever.”

  “You will be,” he said earnestly.

  She put her hands on her hips and turned around to study the only shelter within twenty miles—twenty miles of narrow, rutted road, rotten logs, fearsome dark shadows, bears, and who knows what other starving, slobbering, sharp-fanged animals. A raindrop hit her nose, and pretty soon another splattered on her chin. The one that hit her forehead dribbled down her cheek like a tear.

  “Come on, Kevin,” she muttered, “there ain’t no point in standing out here in the rain. You may not have the sense to come out of it, but I reckon I do. Fetch the flashlight and the food and the blankets. It’s most likely filthy in there, but it’ll be tolerable for one night.”

  The flashlight and the food and the blankets, Kevin repeated to himself in an increasingly frantic voice, having implemented his first kidnapping with a minimum of planning. Robin Buchanon’s cabin had been deserted for a lot longer than a year, and it hadn’t been a Holiday Inn honeymoon suite to begin with. Now it was likely to house rats, spiders, roaches, snakes—all the things his love goddess didn’t much fancy.

  “You wait there on the porch while I get everything,” he called. He got back in his pa’s car and opened the glove compartment. There was a flashlight and a chocolate bar. Dahlia usually carried a few provisions in her purse, but she hadn’t brought it with her. She was anticipating a picnic supper, sleeping bags, and some form of protection.

  He could lock himself in the car, he supposed, where he’d be safe until it was light enough for her to find a rock and smash the windshield. He told himself knights in shiny armor didn’t do that sort of thing, tempting as it might be, and took his two treasures to the porch.

  “I’ll fetch the rest after you’re inside where it’s safe and dry,” he lied gallantly. He pushed open the door and gestured for her to proceed him. He even went so far as to shine the light for her so she could avoid the animal life.

  “O my Gawd!” she said with a scream, retreating so rapidly that she stumbled into him and the two continued off the porch, arms and legs flailing like windmill blades in a hurricane, and right on into the muddy yard. “Kevvie, there’s a dead man in there!”

  He was having some difficulty breathing, in that she was sprawled on top of him, but he did the chivalrous thing and said, “Are you sure, my love object?”

  “His eyes was wide open and there’s a knife sticking out of his throat,” she managed to say, before she fainted.

  Kevin dearly hoped the rain would revive her before too long.

  I arrived in Hasty half an hour later. Unlike the previous fires, this one was not under control. Cars and pickup trucks blocked the road, and the spectators were out, although most of them were dressed in bathrobes or raincoats and no one carried coolers and lawn chairs. With the darkness, the rain, and the smoke, it was difficult to recognize anyone; if Billy Dick and Willard were present, they were not in sight.

  I abandoned the car in a driveway and hurried among vehicles and clumps of people. A sheriff’s deputy allowed me through the line. Wade and his volunteers were huddled a good block away from the fire, which was burning furiously despite the rain. Sparks swarmed upward like a plague of lightning bugs. The air was bitter with the stench of burning rubber and gasoline. The road was littered wi
th debris from periodic explosions.

  As I caught Wade’s arm, a muffled boom sent balls of fire into the sky. All of us instinctively retreated a few steps. “What happened?” I demanded.

  “Someone heard a bomb go off, looked out the window, and called us,” he said. “We arrived three-quarters of an hour ago, but there isn’t anything we can do, and I’m not risking anyone’s life for a damn gas station. Rain’ll see to it sooner or later.”

  “Could there be someone inside?”

  “The guy that works there made it out a window. He has a nasty burn on one leg, and we sent him to the hospital. I don’t know how many storage tanks there were, but they must have been full. We’ve been watching fireworks since we got here.”

  Harve found us. His black plastic raincoat clung like glittery lizard skin, and a battered canvas hat decorated with fishing flies did little to keep the rain off his stony face. “I’m getting mighty tired of our firebugs,” he said. He started to take out a cigar butt, then realized he wouldn’t have much success in the steady rain. “If we ever catch them, they’re gonna be real sorry.”

  I told him and Wade about my earlier interview. “They were playing with me,” I added. “Ever seen a cat with a baby rabbit?”

  Another boom sent us skittering to the shelter of a doorway, where Harve felt he could risk lighting a cigar. “How ya doing with the other case?” he asked as he struck a match.

  “We’ve had a minor setback. However, I may have stumbled onto a connection that might mean something,” I said, sighing. I was going to pull him aside to explain further, but he seemed more interested in the fire, and I finally went to my (Ruby Bee’s) car and drove back to Maggody.

  Darla Jean McIlhaney stared at the shadows on her bedroom ceiling. Frederick Marland had called earlier in the evening with the bad news: Arly knew. The good news, he’d assured her, was that Arly didn’t know everything. Once Darla Jean’d stopped crying, he’d told her what to say, and had stayed on the telephone to coach her with the lines until she felt comfortable with them. Sorta comfortable, anyway. She was never comfortable telling lies, not even when she knew she’d get grounded if she told the truth.