R.P. Dahlke - Dead Red 03 - A Dead Red Oleander

by R. P. Dahlke

  Bud was an enigmatic Rubik’s Cube. Ask the right question and it would unlock his very able mind to all sorts of interesting trivia. Ask the wrong question, one that went with supposition and gossip, and he was just as likely to take his dishrag from under the counter and go back to putting a shine on the bar. Add to it any mention of Detective Rodney and it might start up a sneezing fit

  “You see my chief pilot, Mad Dog, in here lately?”

  He grunted a laugh and started wiping the bar.

  “Okay, okay. Did you see him four nights ago with a stranger?”

  “Let me make it easy on both of us, Miss Bains. He was here the night of your barbeque, and he came in one more time after that. I haven’t seen him since. I never met your other pilot, though I heard you foiled a kidnapping attempt on the wife?”

  Pearlie to Mad Dog and Mad Dog to Bud. “Yes, I did. I shot one in the leg, and hog-tied the other for the police. About the night of the barbeque, did Mad Dog come in alone?”

  Bud looked over my shoulder, as if counting ghostly impressions of that night’s clientele. He nodded in the affirmative, waiting for the next question.

  “But he met up with someone?” At his encouraging nod, I asked, “Here at the bar?” He nodded again. I took a sip of courage and plowed on to the next question. “Do you think you could describe the guy to me?”

  “I can do better than that. I got a picture of him on my cell phone,” he said, pulling his cell out of a back pocket. “One of the regulars wanted a picture of his pretty girlfriend.” He scrolled through the pictures until he found the right one and slid it across so that I could see. “This is the guy, next to the girlfriend. Looks surprised and none too pleased, doesn’t he?”

  I squinted at the photo. It would look better on my computer. “Can you e-mail this to me?”

  “Sure thing,” he said, and after I gave him my e-mail address, he clicked a button, and it was done. Still looking at the picture on his cell, he said, “Think he’s the same guy who broke into your house?”

  “I don’t know. He and his partner were masked. The police took away the one guy I caught. Larry Bonneville. Ever hear of him?”

  “Sure. I quit serving him a couple years ago. I hear he’s taken his considerable business to a bar in Riverbank.”

  “Would you know the name of the place?”

  He ignored my question. We both knew why. A biker bar in Riverbank was no place for Lalla Bains. “I didn’t see this guy as someone who was trouble until he made a grab for my cell phone.”

  That got my attention. “Was he aggressive about it?”

  “He acted drunk. Said he wanted to see if the girl was as pretty in a photo as she was in person. I know an act when I see one. I put my cell in my back pocket, stepped out of his reach, and kept an eye on him. It wasn’t more than five minutes later, he and Mad Dog left.”

  “Bud, he may come back for your cell phone.”

  “I’m not worried, but he’s not someone you want to tangle with, Miss Bains.”

  “I already got him in the leg.”

  “Which leg you shoot him in?”

  “The left. Why?”

  “First guy come in here favoring his left, I’ll haul out my shotgun and shoot him in the other leg. How’s that?”

  It was so much hubris and we both knew it, but Bud wasn’t giving up his cell phone or his dignity for anyone.

  <><><><><>

  Back at the ranch, my father, Cousin Pearlie, and Aunt Mae were sitting around the kitchen table. The women were snapping the strings off fresh green beans. My dad seemed to be perfectly content to sit in the kitchen, reading his paper and ignoring the feminine conversation flowing around him like water over pebbles in a stream. I knew better.

  He took no notice of me, but Cousin Pearlie and Aunt Mae demanded a recount of the day. I should start texting them—it would save time.

  “Do you think she’ll get bail?” asked Pearlie.

  “It will depend on whether or not Marshal Balthrop can convince the judge she’s not a flight risk.”

  “I feel so sorry for her,” Pearlie said. She could afford to be magnanimous now that her perceived rival was in jail. “Poor thing. Losing your friends and your identity. I can relate since someone stole my identity not once but twice.”

  My dad let one edge of his paper drop as he examined Pearlie over his reading glasses. “I thought you looked different.”

  Aunt Mae snorted, and Pearlie threw a green bean at him. It bounced off his paper and landed on the table.

  I scooped up the bean and dropped it into the bowl. “I’m going to take a shower and then a nap,” I said. “Supper at five?”

  The girls agreed on dinner time, and I hurried up the stairs, anxious to take a look at my e-mails.

  Sure enough, there was the digital image attached to an e-mail from Bud. The man’s face was partially in shadow, but the side that I could see was of an even-featured, nondescript white male—except for that one dark eye piercing through the screen of my computer, into my room, stabbing me with an animosity that took my breath away. I clicked on Caleb’s e-mail address, forwarded it to him, then slammed the laptop shut, cutting off the penetrating connection, the one that said he knew who I was and where I lived, and he could come take me out anytime he got around to it.

  Too keyed up to rest, I took a shower and then called Caleb and told him what I was sending him.

  “Yes, I know I said I wasn’t going to Bud’s, but I got thirsty. Besides, you’re going to thank me when you see the picture of this guy. You’ll put it on the national criminal database won’t you?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. You sure you don’t want to come into town and do it yourself?”

  “You don’t have to be mad, Caleb. I told you, Bud is allergic to police.”

  “You have a point, but next time will you please give me a heads-up, so I’ll know where to collect the body?”

  “Caleb!”

  “Awright, calm down,” he said. “Let me look at this. Yeah, I see it, but it’s not much of a picture, is it?”

  “It should be enough, Caleb. This has got to be the same man who attempted to kidnap Nancy, and the one I shot in the leg.”

  Caleb’s humming was testing my nerves. He grunted something that sounded like, “See you later,” and didn’t even say thank you for the only picture we had of the killer. Jeez, what did a girl have to do to get a thank-you? Someone had to find this guy and it was looking more and more like it might have to be me.

  <><><><><>

  I heard a car and from my upstairs bedroom looked out the window. Not Caleb or Jim Balthrop, and not anyone else I knew, either. I heard the doorbell ring and five seconds later the kitchen door slammed. That would be my dad making an exit for the back forty, where he could avoid any contact with strangers. As every neighbor knew to go around to the kitchen door at the back of the house, a knock on the front door meant our visitor was a stranger. A lifetime of habit, and part of country hospitality, was now gone.

  Since I was already halfway down the stairs, I yelled at Aunt Mae and Cousin Pearlie to stay put. I would see who was leaning on our doorbell.

  “Can I help you?” I asked because I had my dad’s shotgun behind my back.

  Of medium build, sandy-haired, even-featured, he was, I thought, about right for Jack Lee Carton.

  Seeing my grim expression, he removed his sunglasses and smiled, blinding me with his super white, even teeth.

  “You must be Lalla Bains? I’m Joe Netherton.” He put his hand into his coat pocket and I brought out the shotgun. He held up two fingers and slowly extracted a business card.

  “Most people don’t usually think my presence warrants a shotgun, but the day is still young.” Seeing that comment didn’t break the ice, he said, “I’m with the Modesto Bee. My boss said you might be a little jumpy, what with all that’s happened this last week.”

  I took his card, but didn’t lower the shotgun. Anyone could have a business card made up. “Del P
otts still editor for the Modesto Bee?” I asked, knowing full well Del Potts had never been the editor and after last year, he and Jan Bidwell had moved to Chicago where they were working for the Tribune.

  He blinked, then smiled. “No, ma’am. You must be mistaken. Mr. Sutton has been the editor of the Bee since my dad retired a year ago. You want to call and ask? The number’s the same as on the card.”

  “Won’t be necessary because I’m still not talking to you. If you want a statement, please contact Detective Gayle Rodney of the Modesto police.”

  He shrugged, and taking a little notebook out of the same inside pocket, started to write it all down. As I was spelling Rodney for him, Pearlie nudged me aside. “Who is it, sugah? Oh, hi there.”

  “Joe Netherton,” he said, reaching out to capture Pearlie’s hand. Pearlie, never one to miss out on meeting a new man. He wasn’t exactly Superman, but he wasn’t Jimmy Olsen either.

  When he asked her what she could tell him about the pilot’s wife arrested for the murder of her husband, Pearlie invited him in for ice tea and conversation.

  Before I could object, Joe Netherton was sitting at our kitchen table, a round of ice tea at the table for all of us. I would’ve excused myself, but decided to stick around in case Pearlie let something slip she shouldn’t.

  So far, the conversation stayed on her, where she was and what she’d been doing at the time. Clearly, the newspaper guy was bored, but I wasn’t going to jump in and help him out, either.

  Pearlie got to the subject of Mad Dog, and my antennae went on full alert. I put down my ice tea. “What did you say?”

  Annoyed that I was interrupting, she huffed, “Weren’t you listening? I was telling Joe here how Mad Dog, er—Robert Schwartz—that’s spelled S-C-H-W-A-R-T-Z, never woulda met that Jack person if he hadn’t taken the call in the first place.”

  I looked from Pearlie to the newspaper man, who was bouncing his pencil lightly on his notepad pretending indifference.

  I did a Pearlie flick of my fingers to indicate she should continue. “I guess I was daydreaming. Go on, Pearlie.”

  Joe flipped his pages back a few and said, “I understand that the dead pilot and his wife were in the witness protection program. Can you verify that, Ms. Bains?”

  “I’d rather not. I can give you the marshal’s name and number if you want to try him, but I don’t think it’s our place to talk about it.”

  “Fair enough. Then can you tell me why Nancy Treat was staying at your home, and not her own house?”

  Oh, boy. This kid was smarter than he looked. He went with a question he knew I wouldn’t answer for one that I might, assuming I wanted to at least appear cooperative. I ran through several scenarios before I settled on the pity ploy.

  “Since he was our pilot, my dad and I decided she shouldn’t be alone so soon after her husband’s death.”

  Pearlie anxiously wriggled in her chair. I figured she was dying to add that my dad also objected to Nancy staying with us, and how Nancy might’ve killed her husband when she injected him with a lethal poison.

  Joe Netherton glanced her way but continued to talk to me. “So you had no idea that gangsters might show up and try to kidnap her?”

  I held up my hands in mock horror. “Gangsters! Oh, good heavens, no. It was a home invasion robbery. One was captured, and I shot the other one. I’d say they got the worst end of the deal.” I leaned over, glanced at his notes, and changed the subject. “I’m sure your readers would be more interested in my upcoming wedding to Sheriff Caleb Stone. My cousin Pearlie and my great-aunt are here for the party.”

  “Yes, ma’am, and congratulations on your impending nuptials. If I may ask one last question, I’ll get out of your hair.”

  I waited, feeling the sweat starting to leak through my shirt. Would he ask me something that would once again embarrass my family or corrupt Caleb’s investigation?

  I was hoping my voice didn’t quiver when I answered. “Yes?”

  “If there weren’t any reports of a gunshot victim in any of the local hospitals, do you think that guy is dead, or is he out there waiting for his chance to come back and try again?”

  I shot out of my chair. “I shot him in the leg! If there is a next time I’ll aim higher.”

  Pearlie did one of her grandmother’s snorts. “If you’re thinkin’ he’s going to get the draw on us Bains women, better think again. My grandmother and I are crack-shots and Lalla here ain’t so bad, either. Would you like to see the pistol I keep loaded and handy?”

  “Uh, no, thank you,” he said, standing, putting his notebook into a pocket.

  “Then I’ll see you out,” Pearlie said.

  I shook his hand and decided to wait in the kitchen while Pearlie finally closed the front door behind him. I dropped into the chair and wondered if Pearlie had heard Mad Dog right—he’d taken a call from Jack Lee Carton? If that were true, then he wasn’t a stranger who randomly picked Mad Dog to help him find his ol’ buddy, Dewey Treat aka Arthur Einstein. Pearlie had to have had it right. She may look like a ditsy blonde, but my cousin could quote verbatim most conversations. It went with what I knew of Mad Dog, that he would spin a story into something that fit his purposes. He’d either lied to the police, or he’d lied to Pearlie. Either way, I’d have to take this to Caleb, and soon.

  Pearlie came back into the kitchen with a big grin on her face. “How’d I do, Cuz?”

  “I guess you did okay.” I was still thinking about how Mad Dog might’ve met this Jack guy.

  Pearlie rolled her eyes. “I did better than okay. I didn’t tell him a thing about Nancy and Arthur being in the witness protection program. Granny always says the less a stranger knows about your business, the better. You can thank me now.”

  “Uh-huh.” I was thinking the less Pearlie knew about Nancy the better. I was glad now that I’d kept to my promise not to tell her about Nancy being the target of her godfather’s partners. “I haven’t heard from Jim Balthrop as to when the hearing’s set for bail. I’d better go call Caleb.”

  As I climbed the stairs, Pearlie called up to me, “If she gets bail, she’s not coming back here, is she?”

  I paused in my climb and looked over my shoulder. “Oh, I don’t know. One good turn deserves another, don’t you think?”

  Chapter Fourteen:

  I called Caleb and asked about Nancy’s bail.

  “Sorry, sweetheart. The hearing just finished, and it went like we thought. The judge will not be granting her bail.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Did Jim Balthrop find out any more from the aero-ag flight school and Burdell Smith?”

  “Why’re you asking? They’ve all been cleared. He checked alibis, interviewed the employees, everything.”

  “Just asking. Um, on another subject, I don’t want to get Mad Dog in trouble for something he didn’t do, but Pearlie seems to think he took a call from that Jack Lee Carton before he met him at Bud’s Bar. If that’s so, it might be that Mad Dog was simply enjoying an opportunity to expose Arthur or—”

  “Or, as much as you hate to say it about your pilot, he turned in Arthur for a reward?”

  “Yes,” I answered sheepishly.

  Once again, Caleb’s response was terse, but at least he agreed to check. After a few minutes, he called back and said Mad Dog’s statement said he met the guy in the bar. “But if he’s lying, we need to have another talk.”

  I knew Mad Dog. If he lied, the last thing he’d do was fess up to the lie now. “You’re not going to get him to change his story on this, Caleb.”

  The other end of the line was ominously silent.

  Unable to tolerate dead air, I rushed in to fill it. “At the worst, he’s guilty of poor judgment, and it wouldn’t be fair to drag him in when it was probably nothing.”

  Still no response from Caleb.

  “You there?”

  “Yes, I’m still here, listening to you make excuses for Mad Dog. If you think you can do better than professionally trained i
nvestigators, you’re out of your league, again.”

  “Okay, I won’t. I promise. But Caleb—aren’t you just the teensiest bit interested in knowing how this Jack Lee Carton connected the dots to get to Mad Dog?”

  “Lalla, sweetheart, do you realize how many people are presently working this case? Jim Balthrop and whoever he can wrangle into helping him from his office, most of Modesto homicide, and don’t forget the extra man hours I’m putting in, and the twenty-four-hour patrol on your place. We don’t need you cornering a nervous witness… that is, unless you intend to shoot Mad Dog in the leg too.”

  “Don’t worry. I have no interest in wrestling with Mad Dog for information that is probably wrong anyway.”

  Another bout of silence. “I’ll do this much; I’ll ask him to come in and verify his story. We’ll go over it until he tells me the truth. I’ll let you know.”

  He hung up before I could thank him. I was thinking it was time for me to act on my earlier notion, the one that if Caleb knew about, might mean the end of our relationship. Someone from Sacramento, either at the aero-ag flight school, or, I hated to think it, Burdell Smith, had leaked Arthur’s whereabouts to the Las Vegas partners. And there was no one better suited to ask those questions than me.

  I found my family in the kitchen and told them the news, that Nancy would not be getting bail and that I was going into town to see her at the county jail. Then I would do some chores and come home.

  My cousin looked appropriately subdued, my Aunt Mae looked perplexed, and my dad just shrugged his shoulders and went back to eating his eggs.

  As I put my hand on the back door, he asked, “You going to be home for supper?”

  “Of course, why wouldn’t I?”

  “How about Marshal Balthrop? With Nancy in jail, will he be coming back?”

  “I think so.” None of us had heard from the marshal, but his equipment and his kit bag were still in the TV room.

  “Then how many should I plan on for supper?” Pearlie asked.

  Caleb would want to come out again, if for no other reason than to see what I’d been up to today, and if Pearlie was cooking we could probably count on seeing Mad Dog at the table again. “Six of us? Yeah, plan for six.”