by Bill Hopkins
Ollie made the sign of the cross.
Rosswell asked, “Are you Catholic now? I thought you followed some kind of pagan religion. Norse gods or something.”
“Never hurts to cover all your bases.” Ollie slanted his head sideways, examining the memorial. “I’m partial to Loki. He’s going to destroy the universe one of these days.”
“Herman Melville said, ‘Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.’ ”
“Loki is not a cannibal. Or a Christian.”
Rosswell avoided further discussion of religion. “Besides Ribs Freshwater, what about the other people on the ferry?”
“I told you. The captain didn’t know them. He thinks they were tourists.” Ollie poked Rosswell in the chest. “And you do not know that Ribs Freshwater was on that ferry.”
Rosswell batted the offending finger away from his body. “Isn’t the ferry used by people working in Illinois? Or people coming from over there to work in Missouri?”
“I’m guessing it was too early for commuters or tourists. And Sundays are light traffic days.” Ollie consulted his notes. “The captain thought the other guys were average build, medium height, brown hair, no facial hair, no glasses, no distinguishing characteristics. Vanilla.”
“All of the passengers were male?”
“That’s what the captain said.”
When they reached the restaurant, Rosswell said, “I’m free until tomorrow morning.”
“Are you thinking what you saw is connected to Tina?”
“I hope not. Something bad happened, and Gustave isn’t too concerned about it because he has a lousy witness.”
“That would be you.”
“Correct.”
Ollie stepped closer. “If I’m your researcher, then I have to tell you what I think about Tina.”
“Have at it.”
“She’s dead.”
Rosswell choked, but Ollie continued. “If she’s not dead, then someone’s holding her against her will. She’s pregnant. The people holding her may not know she’s pregnant.”
“They know by now. And my baby could be in danger.”
“Not only that, but why do they want Tina in the first place? Is she wealthy? No. Are you wealthy? No. Tina doesn’t have money and she doesn’t have any deadly secrets.” Ollie stopped, appearing to think about what he’d said. “Does she, Rosswell? Does Tina have some kind of information that could be dangerous to her?”
Rosswell rocked back and forth on his heels, one of his thinking postures, ranking second only to pacing. He guessed that Ollie had been hacking something, or how else could he know that Tina wasn’t rich? Comfortable. That described Rosswell. But not rich.
“Have Mabel pack us a picnic lunch.”
Ollie ignored Rosswell’s attempt to divert the questions. “How about Tina’s parents? Do you know anything about them?”
“Tina moved to Marble Hill when she was a freshman in high school. I never really got to know her parents. They were both…I don’t know…bland. Uninteresting.”
Ollie took another step closer. “Were?”
“They’re both gone now. Let’s get that picnic lunch.”
“Any particular reason we need to get food to go?”
“We’re headed for the scene of the crime.”
Ollie’s eyes widened. “Which scene and which crime?”
Chapter 6
Last Monday Afternoon, continued
At the edge of the Mississippi River, Rosswell concentrated on the ferry approaching the landing where he and Ollie stood. The apple pie Mabel had packed in the lunch disappeared before he said to Ollie, “How many scenes and how many crimes do you think there are?”
“The payphone is one scene. Somebody grabbed her there. How Tina got from Marble Hill to Sainte Gen is a puzzle we need to solve. That will tell us who has her.”
“This is the latest scene. It’s a lot fresher than the payphone.” Rosswell studied the ground. “The payphone and the ferry landing could be unrelated.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” Ollie hunched over and cruised around the site, inspecting the tracks in the sandy dirt of the riverbank. “There are a lot of tire tracks here but they look worthless to me.”
“That’s a painful position to stay in for more than a few seconds. Your back will go out for sure.” Ollie ignored him. If the snitch had worn a deerstalker cap, smoked a calabash pipe, and waved a huge magnifying glass around, Rosswell would’ve told him he was doing a bad imitation of the old Sherlock Holmes movies.
Ollie kneeled, staring at the earth. After several minutes, he stood. “Worthless.”
Together, they combed the area, inspecting the ground for any kind of clue. Nothing.
“There’s only one way to get here.” Rosswell pointed south, down the street leading into the town. “And then the road stops there.” He pointed north, to the end of the road.
Ollie brushed dirt off his pants. “You know how many white vans, pickup trucks, and SUVs there are around here?”
“No, but you do.”
“All told, nine hundred and thirty-six in this county alone. I didn’t check the surrounding counties.”
“That narrows it down. Unless they were out-of-state tourists.”
“Yet all of the vehicles had to drive on this road.” Ollie waved his arm, pointing out the road. “There’s no other way to get here.”
Rosswell stared down the road until the ferry bumped into the landing. He watched the single vehicle—a new yellow Camaro driven by a teenage girl—drive off and head into Ste. Genevieve. The name of the ferry—Grande Dame—struck Rosswell as a snazzy name for a ferry. A deck hand, dressed in canvas overalls and a sock cap, tied the ferry to the dock.
“You said the captain was the only crew aboard.” Rosswell pointed to the dock. “How did you miss the deck hand?”
“He wasn’t on the boat when I was talking to the captain.”
Ollie waved to the captain, who came ashore. “Mr. LaFaire, meet Rosswell Carew.”
The old man’s frizzled gray hair, complemented by a three-day old beard of the same color, was pasted to his head with sweat. “Pleasure.” His tone Rosswell took to mean, I’m busy. Captain LaFaire grasped Rosswell’s hand, squeezing it with a working man’s grip.
“Captain LaFaire,” Rosswell said, “I’ve got some questions if you have a little time.”
Captain LaFaire laughed. “I got a little time.”
“Ollie here asked you about the vehicles you carried across first thing Sunday morning.”
“Yes, sir, he did. But it was the second crossing. Something wrong?”
Rosswell then understood that Gustave hadn’t yet bothered to interview the man. A decision would have to be made whether to tell Captain LaFaire that Rosswell had reported the incident to the cops. Fairness should prevail.
“I wanted to clear up some things. I worry about little things. Insignificant things.” Rosswell was sure that’s what Columbo used to say.
“What’s worrying you?”
“Have you remembered anything else about those four passengers?”
“Not a thing. It’s been a day and a half. I carried a lot more loads since then. Besides, I don’t have time to watch passengers. I watch the currents and feel the wind and taste the air.”
“How long does it take to cross?”
“Depends on the wind, how high the river is, things like that. Eight or ten minutes usually. Sometimes fifteen or twenty, depending on a thousand different things you can’t predict.”
“Did you know any of the passengers?”
“Not a one.”
“What do you do before you start the crossing?”
“Before I set out, I read the river, cataloging every wave and bobble. Home is where I’m headed every time I cross and if I cross and do it wrong, then I’m drowned and I don’t go home.”
“Did you hear a thump on that run?”
Captain LaFaire tapped each of his ears with a forefinger. “I
hear thumps and groans and bumps every time I set out on that bitch.”
“Bitch?”
“The river’s a heartless bitch, waiting to drag you down to her watery bosom.”
“Captain, do you write poetry?”
“I’m French-Canadian. I don’t write it. I talk it.”
Rosswell shook Captain LaFaire’s hand. “Thank you so much for your time. Sorry if we bothered you.”
“Not at all, Ross.”
Rosswell rubbed a thumb on either side of his forehead. People who shortened his first name—which was actually his family name—gave Rosswell a headache.
Captain LaFaire’s interest focused on Ollie. “I was telling my daughter what a nice guy you was, Albert—”
“Ollie.”
“—and all about what you wanted to know. I told her what I could remember about them guys, which was not one sainted thing. She knows ever one of them.”
“Where’s your daughter?”
“Right there.” Captain LaFaire nodded to the deckhand. “Come over here.”
“Jasmine LaFaire,” she said when she reached the men and stuck out her hand.
Rosswell and Ollie shook with her and introduced themselves. Her broad, flat face showed the marks of the wind and the sun. Rosswell detected a fragrance of motor oil on her. Not exactly a pleasing scent, yet not offensive either.
“Ollie,” Rosswell said, “how did you miss the deck hand? Especially a beautiful young woman like this?”
“You already asked me that.”
“And what was your answer?” Rosswell scowled at Ollie. “There were six people on the ferry that morning, not five.”
“So sue me. I miscounted.”
Jasmine laughed, displaying the teeth of a toothpaste model and the voice of a torch song singer. She pointed to a little shack on the shore. “I was in there catching up with the paper work.” She pulled the sock cap off, revealing close-cropped black hair, tipped with silver. Rosswell had never understood beauty shop things but presumed that he was looking at the aftermath of a visit to one. “You have to fill out a form to get a form to find out what form you need to file. The government’s driving me crazy.”
Rosswell said, “Do you have some time to talk to us?”
Jasmine glanced at her watch, then observed the ferry landings on each bank. There were no vehicles waiting on either side. She shrugged, which Rosswell took as a yes.
Ollie said, “Can you tell us what happened on the second Sunday run?”
“You’re a big one.” Jasmine eyed Ollie from top to bottom. He straightened, smiled, and rubbed his head, waiting for her to continue. “Pops had launched right before I heard a big thump to starboard.” Her brown eyes cast a long glance at Ollie’s purple tattoo when he leaned forward, ostensibly to hear her better.
Ollie tapped Rosswell on the shoulder. “She means the right side.” He seemed rather proud of his grasp of things nautical.
Jasmine pointed to the ferry. “That’s the side where the tow is, as you can see. The ferry’s basically a barge with a workboat we call a tow that pulls it across the river. When we reach the other side, the cars drive off the ramp and then the tow turns about. The bow becomes the stern and the stern becomes the bow. Port becomes starboard. Starboard becomes port.”
Ollie said, “She means the back becomes—”
“I know what she means.” Rosswell faced Jasmine, taking over the interrogation. “The barge—where the cars are—never turns?”
“Right.”
“What happened when you heard the thump?”
“Since it was the side where Pops was, it concerned me. A big thump anywhere worries me, but I wanted to make sure the boat and Pops were okay. I ran to where Charlie was looking over the side. The other passengers ran over to see what the excitement was.”
Rosswell realized that was the first name he’d heard. “Who’s Charlie?”
“Charlie Heckle was the guy driving the van. The other guy with Charlie stayed inside the van. I guess he wasn’t curious. He’s got a scar across his face. Charlie, I mean. He told me he got it in a bar fight in Dallas.”
“What caused the thump?”
“Who knows? A log hit us. A big wave. Some kind of debris. Happens all the time, but you can’t brush it aside when you hear something like that. You’d hate to sink in the middle of the Mississippi River.”
“Who were the other passengers besides Charlie and the guy who stayed in the van?”
“Turk Malone and Frankie Joe Acorn.”
Ollie stopped scribbling notes long enough to ask, “Do you know where Turk, Charlie, and Frankie Joe live?”
“Not exactly.” Jasmine tilted her head, then ran a hand through her spiky hair. “Somewhere in Sainte Gen County. I think out in the country.”
“Can you describe them?”
“They all are built kind of average, about five foot nine or ten, all three have brown hair.”
“Beards? Mustaches? Glasses? Scars? Anything that would make them stand out? Besides Charlie Heckle’s knife fight souvenir?”
“Nope.” Jasmine held up a hand. “Wait. Turk’s got what he calls a beard. More like somebody swept the floor of a barber shop and stuck the hair in the dustpan on his face in random patterns.”
Rosswell said, “Have you seen any of those guys before?”
“Oh, sure. Regularly.”
Ollie said, “They do anything suspicious?”
“Suspicious?” Jasmine chewed on her lip for a couple of seconds. “Not that I recall. Can’t say for sure. Let me think some more on that.”
Ollie concentrated on Captain LaFaire, who’d stuck his hands in his pockets, rocked back and forth on his heels, and hummed. “Captain, you said you’d never seen them before.”
“I ain’t got a knack for faces and names like Jasmine does.”
Rosswell said to Jasmine, “What did your dad do after the thump?”
“Pops kept on, like he’s supposed to do. He’s got to watch the currents, the clouds, check the wind, the traffic, all that stuff. He’s in charge the whole time. The deck hand makes sure everything’s okay on the ferry.”
Captain LaFaire said, “You know how hard it is to hit that dock in the middle of a thunderstorm? The Coast Guard doesn’t give away them licenses, you know.”
“Something’s wrong, isn’t it?” Jasmine thought for a few seconds. “Why all this fuss?”
Rosswell ignored her questions. “You’ve got quite a responsibility running this ferry.” He knew he was going to feel like crap when the sheriff finally managed talking to Captain LaFaire and Jasmine. If Gustave told them then that Rosswell had reported a body thrown off Grande Dame, Captain LaFaire and Jasmine would think Rosswell had deceived them now.
Ollie said, “Did you know the passenger in the van Charlie Heckle drove?”
“Sure,” Jasmine said. “He’s a regular. First showed up a couple of weeks ago and been riding once or twice a day. An Indian. Ribs Freshwater.”
Chapter 7
Last Monday Afternoon, continued
“Holy crap!” escaped from Rosswell’s lips before he could stop it. Ribs must’ve been following him, but why? What was the Cherokee doing here? Rosswell’s heart thumped against his ribs. Deciding quickly, he said, “Captain, I need to tell you why we’re asking questions.”
Captain LaFaire clapped once. “You’re writing an article for some tourist magazine. I could tell who you was the minute I seen you.”
“Not quite.” Rosswell pondered how best to break the bad news to Captain LaFaire and Jasmine. The solution was telling them, simply and quickly, like pulling a bandage off a wound. “I’m in Sainte Gen searching for my fiancée, Tina Parkmore. Sunday morning, I was sitting on my balcony at The Four Bee. I saw a man throw a woman overboard from your ferry. That woman looked like Tina.”
Captain LaFaire stomped his foot. “No, sir, not on Grande Dame.” He spoke the name with, as far as Rosswell could tell, a superb French pronunciation. “No one’s
never done nothing like that on my boat.”
“Pops, let’s listen to what he has to say.” Jasmine stroked her father’s arm, then put her arm around his waist. “Ollie, how come the cops haven’t been down here?”
“Good question, the answer to which escaped and is wandering loose.”
Rosswell spoke up. “The truth is I reported it to Sheriff Fribeau who doesn’t believe my story.”
Jasmine said, “You’re a judge, yet he doesn’t believe your story? Why not?”
“Captain,” Rosswell said, hoping Jasmine wouldn’t press the point, “if someone threw a body overboard on this side of the river, where would the current take it?”
Before Captain LaFaire could answer, Jasmine asked, “Ollie, what are you? A private detective or something?”
“Not even in my worst nightmare. I never do anything that requires regulation by the state, especially the part about carrying a badge.”
Rosswell said, “Ollie’s my research assistant, helping me find Tina.”
Jasmine said, “Hope it wasn’t her you saw.”
“Me, too.” Rosswell cleared his throat, determined not to choke up. “Captain LaFaire, how about the body? Where do you think it could go?”
Captain LaFaire said, “The river’s up pretty high. Not flood stage yet but she’s high. Flooding up north, in fact. That body could go anywhere. It might be laying on the bottom of the river. Or might could be stuck on a log a hundred feet downstream. Or floating into New Orleans right now.”
Rosswell said, “Maybe we could talk the sheriff into conducting a search party.”
“Wouldn’t do no good,” Captain LaFaire said. “That would be like looking for a huckleberry in a hurricane. Especially the first mile downstream on this side.”
Ollie said, “What’s wrong with the shore down there?” He indicated southward, along the riverbank.
“Nothing but half-swamp and half-forest. There’s a rock cut in the bluffs that the railroad track takes and swings west, toward town. Between the railroad track and the river it’s nothing but bluffs all growed up. Bunch of caves.” Captain LaFaire appeared to lose interest. A patent ruse. “Except there might be one person who could tell you if there’s a body.”
