Small Town Trouble

by Jean Erhardt

  “I’ve been racking my brain. Unfortunately, because of his deficiencies, Rick Rod makes the perfect scapegoat and he’s got a bit of a police record.”

  “Oh?”

  “Drunk driving, disorderly conduct, that kind of stuff, nothing too serious.”

  “He ever hurt anybody?”

  Amy lit another cigarette. “I guess he did a pretty good number on a guy once in a bar fight, but he was provoked and that was a long time ago.”

  “Rick Rod didn’t cut off the guy’s weenie, did he?”

  “No,” Amy said, emphatically. She blew a stream of smoke out the window toward heaven.

  “Well, at least there’s that.”

  She turned to me. “Kim, somebody planted that knife under Rick Rod’s bed. It was wiped clean of prints.”

  “But who is the question.”

  “Yeah, who,” she said, and sighed. “The police were kind enough to tell me that there was no sign of a break-in at Rick Rod’s place that night. I’m surprised they even bothered to check it out.”

  “Maybe Rick Rod knew his visitor, let him or her in, and, when he wasn’t looking, they stashed the knife under his bunk.”

  “Hell,” Amy said, taking a turn with binoculars, “even when he goes out, he never locks his door. Anybody could’ve waltzed right in.”

  “Swell.”

  “God,” she shivered, “it’s all so creepy.”

  I could see that this one was going to be a tougher nut to crack than the Case of the Missing Boatload of Nikes. Of course, given our present list of possible suspects, chances were good that the killer wasn’t a straight A student so we had that working in our favor.

  If one removed Rick Rod Delozier from the field of candidates, it was dancing Charlene who currently topped my list. I figured we could work with that possibility until a better possibility came along. Amy was inclined to go along with me on this.

  Not counting John Deere and Fat Boy showing up at Jimmy’s with trashy dates, there wasn’t much excitement.

  I ate my cold Big Boy hamburger, Amy had her strawberry pie and we took turns with the binoculars. Pink heat lightning flashed now and again on the horizon, and it was beginning to smell like a rainstorm.

  What was the connection between my cousin Abbott and Jimmy Jacobs? Obviously they’d both been, at one time or other, the object of Charlene’s affection, but was there something else? And if Charlene was Doctor Death, what had gotten into her all of a sudden? It takes a certain breed of gal to pull off a slashing and wiener removal times two, but maybe Charlene was a girl who, on the right starry, starry night, could pull it off.

  But how, if at all, did Larry White and his real estate grubbing fit in?

  The police were painting Rick Rod as the deranged, jilted lover. Amy found out that shortly before the murders, Rick Rod had apparently made quite a scene at Jimmy’s Place. One night, on Charlene’s break, he’d offered to buy her a drink. She’d blown him off, and he’d been audibly unhappy about it. Big whoop. That had happened to me a time or two and it certainly didn’t make me a serial killer.

  But it got deeper. The night of Jimmy Jacob’s ugly demise, Jimmy had 86’ed Rick Rod for general bad behavior and according to witnesses, Rick Rod had then threatened Jimmy. The way the police figured it, Rick Rod had come back that night at closing and done Jimmy, then liked it so much he went on to do Abbott, just because my cousin was Charlene’s current knight in shining armor instead of Rick Rod. It was too bad that Abbott hadn’t been wearing his shining armor when the killer caught up with him that night.

  The police had a tidy little theory that could no doubt put Rick Rod Delozier away for a very long time, like an eternity, but it was a little too tidy for my taste. I’d never been a particularly big fan of Lone Nut Killer Theories anyway. Besides, where were the missing winkies?

  I didn’t know exactly what I hoping for with a stakeout at Jimmy’s Place other than the unexpected, which might lead to something more concrete than what Amy had come up with so far, but I was hoping we’d get a chance to see what Charlene liked to do after hours. Maybe she liked to party with Larry White.

  It was just past midnight when Amy nudged me. “Hey,” she said, “there she goes.”

  Chapter 28

  “Gimme,” I said, snatching the binocs from Amy. After all, I was the professional. Charlene was out the front door all right, headed like a high wind for a compact white car. She looked agitated. I couldn’t tell which form of agitation it was. Maybe she was twerked off at somebody, maybe she looked scared. Maybe she was just excited about getting off work.

  Charlene wore short cutoff jeans, an ultra-tight T-shirt and sneakers. Her white-blond hair was pulled into a huge, floppy bun.

  “What’s she doing now?” Amy wanted to know.

  “Looks like she’s punching out for the night.”

  In the weird blue light of Jimmy’s Place, I watched Charlene unlock her car door. She jumped in and promptly fired up a cigarette, then started the engine. Before I could say booballabies, Charlene sped out of the lot.

  I cranked up the Toyota. “Let’s roll.”

  The rainstorm that had been threatening all evening picked an inopportune time to let go. I flicked the Toyota’s wipers into high gear as the huge splotches came harder and faster, all the while trying to keep Charlene’s car in my view finder. I laid well off her tail, a little too well, actually, and we lost sight of her completely for a few minutes, caught back up, then I lost her again. I was definitely rusty in the tailing department.

  I was also a bit distracted by a persistent pair of headlights in my rearview, but decided that I was just suffering from a slight case of the paranoids.

  “Damn,” Amy said, binoculars once again pressed into action. “Can’t this car go any faster?”

  Amy was right. Faster was the way to go. I put my foot to the pedal, passed a pickup truck which had turned onto the highway, and closed the gap. I was counting on the rain to make it tough on Charlene to notice us if she was inclined to check her rearview. The pavement was slick in spots from oil and from being dry too long, and the dang Toyota was having trouble holding the curves. Maybe I’d trade it in next time for whatever Charlene was driving. At least get myself a new set of tires.

  “Aha,” Amy said, as Charlene’s car came back into view.

  I clocked her. Charlene was doing a cool eighty on the straightaway.

  “Hold up,” Amy said. “I think she’s turning off.”

  Charlene made a hard right, headed out route 132. I let her make the turn, then followed her lead. The rain wasn’t letting up and, at this point, neither was I.

  We went on like this for a couple miles, us on her tail and the rain beating the car like a platoon of angry little drummer boys. Then, without warning, Charlene jammed on her brakes and swerved off to the side of the road. I made a quick decision and, just short of her, cut a sharp right, and we bumped hard down an old rutted lane. I rolled just far enough down the road to get out of sight, then I cut the lights, spun us around and pulled off on the shoulder. I killed the engine and hoped we hadn’t attracted attention.

  We were close enough to hear Charlene’s car humming.

  “Now what?” Amy said.

  I shrugged. “I don’t know yet.” I tried the binoculars again, but they weren’t much help. The trees were thick and clumped in all the wrong places. “What is she up to?”

  “Maybe she lost a contact lens.”

  “Maybe not.” A car coming up the highway from the opposite direction slowed and pulled in behind Charlene. There was the sound of a car door opening and slamming. Charlene’s lights and engine died. Then I heard a man’s deep voice. Hadn’t I heard that voice before? Charlene and the man spoke briefly, then it sounded like Charlene was getting into his car. More door slamming.

  “Whoa,” Amy said, “a low-rent rendezvous?”

  After a moment, his car pulled out of the turnoff, the headlights sweeping the trees, and headed quickly back up
the highway. It looked like Amy and I were back in the tailing business.

  The car was a dark, late-model sedan, nothing fancy, and Charlene was definitely on the passenger side.

  The rain had let up a hair and Amy was working the binoculars again. “I think they might be arguing,” Amy said. “She’s waving her hands around.”

  “You get a look at the guy?”

  “Just the back of his head. He doesn’t appear to be wearing a hat, if that’s helpful.”

  Amy was getting good at this. “Can you read the plate?” Maybe I’d get lucky later and find someone to run it.

  Amy refocused. “Nope. Can’t quite make it out. Get closer.”

  I knew it was risky, but I working for Amy now. I gave the Toyota more gas and moved in on them.

  “Oh, for chrissake,” Amy said, “I think they’re kissing.”

  “Well, are they arguing or kissing?” I had seldom done these simultaneously with much success and figured no one else did either.

  “Get closer.”

  I was practically driving up his tailpipe now. I took a good look, mentally noted the plate and backed off a bit. Amy was right the second time. They were making out. Charlene had her arms around the guy’s neck and, in between road checks, she’d suck on his face.

  “Well, this is interesting,” Amy said.

  Romeo was a young, dark-haired guy I’d seen before. In fact, I’d recently sat across from him at Evelyn’s breakfast table. It was Officer Mike.

  Chapter 29

  Officer Mike hung a left on Cemetery Road. I slowed enough to catch them pulling off at the bottom of the hill. It looked like he was trying to hide his car behind a dilapidated outbuilding. This was familiar territory. We were just on the backside of WFOG, and I knew if I took the next turn off and circled back on the old wagon road, we could get some sort of shot at them from above. I figured it was possible that even Officer Mike didn’t know about the old route or more correctly, what was left of it. Basically it went from nowhere to nowhere. It probably didn’t appear on anybody’s map.

  “Let’s hope this isn’t what it looks like,” Amy said.

  I fully expected to find Charlene and Officer Mike half-naked, going to funky town in the back seat of his car.

  “Hey, they’re gone,” Amy said.

  “What do you mean gone?”

  “Take a look.” She handed me the glasses. Unless they were under the seats, the sedan was empty of occupants, but something caught my eye. Off to the right, I saw the glint of a flashlight moving uphill through the trees not far from us.

  “A night hike in the rain. How romantic.”

  I’d nearly pulled off just where they were headed. Luckily, I’d rolled a little further down the road before stopping. It could have been much further down the road for my taste.

  We watched them slowly thread their way up a trail of some sort, climbing higher and higher. Charlene was hardly dressed for a hike in the drizzle, but at least Officer Mike had loaned her his jacket which she had stretched over her head. When they got to the old wagon road, they stopped. Officer Mike shined his flashlight up and down the road like he was surprised to find it. Maybe he was just playing it safe and checking both ways for speeding covered wagons.

  “Holy crap,” Amy said as Officer Mike beamed the flashlight in our direction. Amy slid down in the seat. I thought we’d been spotted, and instinctively, I made a grab for the key in the ignition. We were nosed in the wrong direction, but maybe I could pull a U without ripping the bottom out of the Toyota, maybe. Just when I was about to give it a whirl, I saw Charlene point at something across the road. Officer Mike turned his light in the direction she pointed. They exchanged a few words, then they crossed the old road and slipped into the black woods, out of sight.

  “Now what?” I said.

  Amy and I weren’t dressed for a night hike either, but if Charlene could tough it out, so could we.

  “I didn’t even wear socks,” Amy said. “There’s gotta be scads of poison ivy out there.”

  I figured we’d be lucky if a patch of poison ivy was the worst thing we met up with, but we’d come this far and, rhus toxicodendron or no, we were going for it now.

  It had occurred to me that while Officer Mike may be a big, strong boy, with Charlene in tow his longevity could be in real danger. From where I sat, it looked like her boyfriends were a quickly vanishing breed. Of course this was only one scenario. It had now dawned on me that it was equally possible that our off-duty Officer Mike was dirty. What if he was the deranged lover and had whacked Jimmy Jacobs and Cousin Abbott? That would certainly explain why the police were so happy with their neat, little case against Rick Rod. After all, hadn’t it been Officer Mike who’d gotten the mysterious phone tip and made the big hero collar on Rick Rod? He could easily have planted the knife and set Rick Rod up for the murders.

  On the other hand, it was possible that Charlene and Officer Mike were twisted small-town lovers, and they were in it together, whatever it was. It was hard to figure out which scenario to root for.

  These were the unappealing thoughts that raced around my brain as Amy and I left the sanctuary of the Toyota and started hoofing it for the woods.

  The rain had turned to a steady, fine shower. It was the kind of rain I liked, but I knew I’d have to enjoy it some other night. I wasn’t crazy about fumbling around in a dark, wet forest with no flashlight and two murder suspects, but sometimes a girl just has to do what needs doing.

  “This really sucks,” Amy said, an understatement. “And, shit, I’m scared.” She was about two steps behind me as we edged along what really couldn’t be considered a path.

  “Pretend you’re an Indian.” It wasn’t working for me, but maybe it would for Amy.

  “Yeah, right.”

  There are times when I really, really wished I owned a gun. Ted did, a big old .357 Magnum, and he often kept it stashed under the front seat of his van. A smart guy, that Ted, but he wasn’t around and I was pretty sure that Amy wasn’t packing.

  “This probably isn’t one of the times when one calls the police, is it?” Amy said. She was on the same mental track that I was. She was also right on my heels, holding tightly to my belt loop, an old Indian trail trick, no doubt.

  We made our way as best we could, dodging low-hanging branches, jumping ravines, stepping around potholes or sink holes or snake holes or whatever the hell they were, generally trying to move in a forward direction without completely losing sight of Charlene and Officer Mike or breaking our necks.

  “Sure am glad I wore my good sandals,” Amy said. “They’re absolutely ruined, and so are my ankles.”

  Then something moved in the underbrush not far from my right big toe. I was glad I wasn’t wearing sandals.

  Amy stifled a scream, and we held perfectly still. Whatever it was, it was dark and furry and about the size of a small pig. After a brief standoff, it suddenly shot off stage right and left a wake.

  “Christ on toast,” Amy said, letting out her breath.

  Now and again we could make out the small, bobbing light of Officer Mike’s flashlight. Apparently, Charlene hadn’t killed him yet and as far as I could tell, he hadn’t offed her either, but if this prolonged, nocturnal goose chase didn’t lead to something very interesting very soon, I was going to kill them both.

  Memory told me that we were close to being out of the woods, so to speak. Years ago, my brother Clint and I had played in and around these parts, doing the things that country kids normally did, riding bulls, swinging naked on grapevines, smoking bootlegged cigarettes and swilling beer, but that was a long time ago, back when Clint was still occasionally fun to be around.

  “If I’m not way off,” I said, “any minute now we should all end up in the field behind WFOG.”

  “And then they kill us, right?”

  “You’re not accentuating the positive, Amy.”

  “Hey, I’m not Jiminy Cricket, all right?”

  I wasn’t way off. We crouche
d in the thicket at the edge of the field on the hindside of WFOG. Officer Mike had killed his flashlight, and he and Charlene seemed to be stealthily creeping around the old pasture.

  “What are they doing?” Clearly, Amy wasn’t amused.

  “A scavenger hunt?”

  “They sure took the long way around to get here.”

  For a long while, Charlene and Mike walked here and there around in the knee-high weeds. I trained the binocs on them, but couldn’t make out what the hell they were up to.

  “Furtive little fuckers.”

  “Maybe they’re looking for the missing dicks,” Amy said.

  At this point, anything seemed possible.

  The rain shower passed, and just enough moon came out to make you wish there was a little more. We’d been hanging around watching them hang around for what seemed like an eternity, but then Mike’s light flicked back on, and they started back for the woods. Fortunately, it looked like they were aiming to retrace their steps and not ours. We laid very low as Charlene and Officer Mike passed by us not twenty yards to the left. Amy was pressed next to me like a Siamese twin. I could feel her hot breath on my neck and arms. Any other time, this might have been pleasantly arousing, but not this time. We lay there, stretched out on our stomachs like terrified soldiers hidden in the damp thicket, still as corpses.

  It wasn’t until long after the sound of their footsteps had disappeared completely into the night woods that I dared move a muscle. I, for one, wanted to put plenty of forest between them and us.

  “The coast is clear,” Amy whispered, peeking around.

  “Let’s go have a look.”