A Living Grave

by Robert E. Dunn

The white pickup truck slowed on shrieking brakes, and then wheeled around after passing. They had seen me. I had seen them. It was a small truck, but it carried three men up front and six in the back. All were armed.

  Even over the old engine and bad brakes, even over my own ragged breathing, I could hear the excited shouts of the men.

  Summer’s over.

  I said good-bye, in quiet thoughts, to my mother and father. All thoughts had become prayers. Everyone who had ever done me harm, I forgave, except the men who had put me where I was. Then I waited for the real death.

  One man jumped down from the truck bed and the others stayed behind, shouting. I couldn’t tell if the shouts were instruction or encouragement. The bolt on an AK-47 was pulled. All the shouting stopped.

  I’m not ready.

  The shouting started up again, but it was different in tone and urgency. The man with the AK ran back to the truck. He sprayed a wash of rounds at me without aiming as the truck left the road and took off across open ground.

  A moment later, I watched as a column of Humvees stopped short of my position. A squad of men piled out and formed a perimeter. A sergeant I had never seen before stalked up to me with his weapon at the ready. He looked close and long before calling back, “We need a medic and a litter up here.”

  * * *

  I rose early in the damp chill of sunrise on the lake. Every breath captured the full life smell of watery fecundity and the slow decay of deadwood. Carried across the width of deep liquid green was the sound of a woodpecker hammering his way into the carcass of a standing, dead cedar. I noticed all of it, but appreciated nothing as I skulked from the houseboat to my truck. The beauty of the world around me felt like something to hide from after a night spent reliving what I had come to think of as my first death. Closing the truck door shut it all out. It failed to shut out the shame I felt. It might have helped if I hadn’t carried the jar of whiskey with me.

  At home I cleaned up and caffeinated. I did it all like someone trying to ignore a camera in their bedroom. I kept all my thoughts behind a veil of normalcy. Then I caught myself looking out from the mirror. So much of me was gone from what I was.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I said to myself. I looked back with sad eyes and scars that seemed to disagree. It was an odd sort of shame that I felt; I was ashamed of what others had done to me. I was ashamed of the flashbacks that made me relive it. Both seemed like a kind of weakness. I kept staring at myself, the short hair with the red summer cooked into a burnished penny color, the scars that tracked my skin, the pale skin and faded freckles that spoke of hiding under mannish clothing for so long. All those things carried an accusation that I had been facing for a decade.

  While I stared I saw the girl, Angela Briscoe. Finding her, seeing her body in the woods, had pulled the hammer back on me, then pulled a slow-motion trigger. The thought and self-knowledge that came with it did nothing to lessen any of the effects of the flashback. But they did serve to make me mad. It was the anger about her that got me out of the bathroom.

  Powder fresh and dressed for work, I carried a thermos full of hot, black coffee out into the world, resolved—once again—to keep my ghosts behind me. When I climbed into the truck, I saw myself in the mirror again. This time I tried something the therapist had told me. I tried to visualize what others saw rather than my own judgment. What I visualized was Nelson Solomon looking at me, more than what I imagined he saw. But it made me smile. Smiling changed the image and I brushed the hair back from the scar beside my eye. That was the woman I wanted him to see.

  I felt a little hope and then I felt a little shame. Story of my life, really. Suddenly I thought of the night before, with my uncle, and regretted telling him about Nelson. It was a mixture of wishful thinking on my part and the desire to seem normal to my family. Uncle Orson would tell my father. For a while Dad would be hopeful that his daughter had finally walked away from the damage in her life. I looked away from the rearview mirror and tucked it all away. I had work to do.

  My official day began when I called in and let Darlene know I would take my own vehicle to make a couple of calls following up on the murder of Angela Briscoe.

  First, I went to the murder scene. I stopped at the convenience store for a soda. Thirty-two ounces was 99 cents and twice that much was $1.19. I got the giant size. It was an offering of thanks for a long, boring job. I passed it through the window on the cruiser posted on the road where I had first met Clare. The deputy was William Blevins by his nameplate, but everyone called him Billy. It wasn’t just an affectionate nickname; it was because he looked to be twelve years old. He was short and pudgy with wire glasses and a kid’s haircut. The hair came courtesy of a barber named Finas Gold who was half blind and, it’s said, learned his trade snipping hair under bowls before sending boys off to Korea. Billy was one of those people who you never imagined in uniform. Funny and nerdy looking, it was easy to imagine him being bully bait in school until you met him. After knowing him for a few minutes everyone liked him. Even bullies. I don’t know how he became a deputy, but he was always doing the work no one else wanted. Honestly, I think it was to be sure he was kept safe and out of harm’s way. But he did his jobs well and without complaint.

  “How’d you know?” he asked me with a grateful smile as he took the soda. He took a big drink with his eyes closed. “Thanks. I really needed that.”

  “Your vices are open secrets, Billy. They aren’t really vices, either.”

  “Caffeine.”

  I watched him take another long drink. “Anything happen overnight?”

  “News trucks all left by eleven. I heard some noise out that way.” He pointed north with the soda cup. “And probably a truck driving around. It was up the road a ways. I called it in, then went to keep an eye on the scene just in case someone was trying to get around me.”

  I was impressed. Any other deputy would have been bored and happy to go check on the noise. When I said that to Billy, he shrugged and said, “I wasn’t told to check out noises or cars. I was told to make sure no one went past that tape.”

  It was good to know there was still someone who did his job, even a small one, with respect and pride. Someday he’d probably be the sheriff, and I would be working for him.

  “Did they find anything?”

  “It was quiet by the time anyone got here. I called it in at . . .” he checked a notebook even though it should have been recorded at the station. “Four-twenty-eight.”

  “Okay. I’m going to have a look around. What time are you being relieved?”

  “Don’t know that I am.” He read the look on my face. “Something wrong?”

  “Probably nothing,” I told him. “This killing is going to get a lot of attention. I’m afraid our scene will get a lot as well.”

  “Kind you want it to get or the kind you don’t want it to get?”

  “What are you asking, Billy?”

  “If you just want the scene kept clean, I can hang around and make myself obvious. Looky-loos won’t stop if cops are here. If you want to see who comes in for a closer look . . . well, I can bring a pole and a book. There’s a nice spot close by.”

  I never said I was above taking advantage of someone’s good nature. Billy had to return the cruiser and pick up his truck, but he’d be back within the hour to set up his off-the-clock surveillance. Until he was back I planned to stick around and check some things out.

  The field and trail showed new wear from all the activity of the previous day. In the wooded area the ground was pinned in places by wires with little plastic flags. They marked where evidence had been taken. In a wide, rough circle crime-scene tape was strung from tree to tree centered on a blank spot where Angela had died. The only remaining evidence of her presence was blood spatter that haloed a void where her face had been crushed.

  There was no new evidence and no startling revelations waiting. That was for television. Real police work was based on logging hours of repetitive tasks and questions. Very of
ten the job isn’t finding out who did the crime. It’s more about proving the case against the person you already know to be guilty. Most murders are committed by someone known to the victim. That only holds truer with the murder of a child.

  Along the stream bank there were a few more flags where rocks had been moved and the one marking where a roundish stone had been found with blood and hair on it. Beyond that I headed north, the opposite direction I had taken with Clare the day before.

  Everything yesterday had been about the girl and my supposition that Clare and his whiskey were only coincidentally involved. The biker—make it bikers now—had taken a run right up to the top of the suspect ladder. That meant their interests had to be examined. One was seen here near the murder scene. The day of or day after the murder, he was kicking an artist around. That same day, another one was seen close to the dead girl’s home.

  Connections.

  Upstream and on a bend where the bank was shallow I found what I was looking for. Across the water, around a black burn mark, was a pile of cinder blocks, a pile of firewood, and a few old pallets tucked within a copse of trees. I crossed the stream for a closer look. The ground was clean, surprisingly so. There were parallel lines where a rake had been dragged through the grass and bare dirt. Even so, whomever had tidied up had left behind several bits of broken glass from canning jars and tatters of brown paper. The paper was the same tough, thick stuff feed sacks are made from. It wasn’t until I saw the paper that I noticed the kernels of corn scattered around.

  There was still a surprise waiting and I found it by smell, not by sight. It was a rich, yeasty smell but sweet as well, like a bakery gone bad. I followed my nose outside the main circle and, under an old hedge apple tree, found a compost bin cobbled from the wood of more pallets. It looked like Clarence Bolin was a green bootlegger. Inside the bin were the solid sediment of the missing still along with food scraps, hedge apples dropped from the tree, and a dead armadillo. I had no idea if you could compost the leavings of your still, but I had to give the guy points for trying.

  For a while I poked around, partially just killing time. I found fresh tire tracks in a rutted path where the still had been carried out the night before. How long did it take to set up in a new spot and begin a new batch? How long did a batch take from start to finish? I didn’t know anything about moonshine. I decided to make Clare my personal mentor on the subject as soon as I got hold of him.

  Billy came back in less than an hour. Even at that he’d already drained and refilled his soda cup.

  Chapter 5

  The home of Nelson Solomon was one of those best-of-both-worlds places only the wealthy ever seem to manage. It was close to town, in this case Branson. And it was still secluded, tucked into a cliff top lot with a view of the lake. It was my second stop of the morning. Solomon’s assault looked even less random now that I knew Cotton Lambert had been at both crime scenes. That raised questions, serious questions that needed better answers than I’d gotten yesterday.

  The only approach to the house was a meandering gravel drive that switched back on itself a couple of times before dumping out on a large, paved parking area. As soon as I pulled onto the concrete pad I heard a motorcycle start. It was a big Harley V-twin with loud pipes that roared as the engine revved up. A familiar sound. When it ran by me like a scalded cat it carried the smell of hot exhaust. Even over that, I swear I could smell the rider, a raw mix of sweat, grease, old beer, and tobacco. He was a big man with long, ratty hair and a beard to match. His head was bare but his eyes were covered by dark sunglasses.

  He was not Lambert, the man whose picture I carried in my pocket. It was the one Carrie had identified as Leech. He was the same type, though. And I was willing to bet the pair of them belonged to the same club. This time I got a look at the patch.

  When I saw Lambert running from the scene of Solomon’s beating he was wearing a leather vest with his colors. This guy, Leech, was wearing a cut, the traditional denim jacket with sleeves sliced off, but the patches on the back were the same. This time I was close enough to see them clearly. There was a center image of a masked Bald Knobber, with a rocker patch above that read Ozarks Nightriders, and one below that read Missouri. To the side was a smaller white patch that had the MC for “motorcycle club.” I had heard of them; nothing good. Missouri had been open ground for a while and several clubs had formed or chapters of established clubs moved in. They were all tangling over turf and trade. From what we’d been hearing, these guys were big into meth.

  They had to be local. No one else would use a Bald Knobber mask in their colors. Bald Knobbers were a violent vigilante group in the Ozarks, mostly in the late 1800s. In night rides, they ran off blacks or burned out white farmers they didn’t like, using the whip and the torch to enforce their will on the region. Like the Klan would wear peaked hoods and white robes to hide their identity, the Bald Knobbers wore masks made from flour sacks with embroidered eye-holes and tasseled horns. They took their name from the bare tops of hills called bald knobs where they held their secret meetings. There was a time in these hills when night riders inspired a level of dread to which their modern imitators could never aspire. That, I think, is because of the collusion of the citizenry. Bikers wallow in the idea of being outsiders living apart from society. The Bald Knobbers, and all of the other various night-riding groups that our nation spawned between the Civil War and the First World War, were not outsiders. They were what masks allowed citizens to become.

  There was no damage to the house that I could see. I had either caught the biker just as he arrived or he was waiting for someone. Nelson, I would guess. I would guess also that he hadn’t been there to have a quiet chat about art. Nelson Solomon was a target of some nasty people. The questions were why and did he know more than he claimed?

  I left the house under the care of a deputy named Calvin Walker.

  “So you’re gonna just stick me with babysitting a rich guy’s house?” Calvin asked me after I explained the situation to him.

  Calvin was not my best friend in the department. In fact, he didn’t like me very much at all. I resisted the urge to tell him how useless he was. Something I didn’t always do, to tell the truth. Another benefit of therapy.

  “You’re not babysitting the house,” I told him, quite patiently, again. “The man who lives here was assaulted by one of these bikers yesterday. I don’t know where he is or why this is happening. You are here to make sure the bikers don’t come back before he does so they can try again.”

  “Babysitting,” he said.

  “Call it what you want, Calvin. Just do it.”

  “You know what your problem is, Hurricane?”

  “I’m sure you’re dying to tell me, but you need to know something first.” I looked him hard in the eyes and took a step closer. “If you even think the word—period—I swear to God it’ll be the last thought you have.”

  “You know, sexual harassment works both ways. You’re making a very uncomfortable work environment for me.” He presented me with the kind of grin Uncle Orson always referred to as shit-eating.

  That was the kind of thing I’ve had to deal with every day of my working life: Boys getting petty and wanting to test you every moment. There’s no way to pass, but every failure is tallied up and held against you. If I don’t play along, I’m a bitch. If I do, I’m a dyke. Go through channels and complain—well, that’s just something I’ll never do again.

  After a few more words I left Calvin and headed back to Forsyth to check in with the notes and calls I left the day before. On 160 I had passed the water tower and was coming up on Forsyth Hardware when I saw a familiar car. The girl sitting on the hood was familiar as well. Carrie Owens.

  I pulled in and parked alongside the same Chevy I had first seen her on.

  When she saw me she smiled, but it was a cautious smile.

  “Hi, Carrie,” I said through my open window.

  She glanced at the storefront trying to see through the glass before
she looked back at me and said, “Hello. I’m just waitin’ on Danny.”

  “That’s fine,” I told her. “There’s no law against waiting.”

  Her smile eased up a bit and she said, “You’re not in the cop car.”

  “No, not today. Does that mean I should show you my badge?”

  “No,” she laughed. “I’ll trust you.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. Trust is important.” Then in a quieter, conspiratorial tone I said, “Especially between us girls.”

  She smiled again, but something about it was broken. Like she hadn’t gotten that it was a joke. Her body tensed and her lips froze, but her eyes were someplace else. I had said something wrong but I had no idea what. The faraway look in her eyes, though—that I had ideas about.

  “Are you all right, Carrie?” I asked her.

  “Sure,” she said quickly. Her eyes came back with a new hardness to them. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “You kind of went away for a second, there. I wondered—”

  “I should go inside. I need to see what’s taking Danny so long.”

  “Okay, Carrie. If you think you should. But I wanted to ask you something first.”

  She had scooted down off the hood of the car and I noticed how low her jeans were riding on her bony little hips. The panties that peeked out of the waistband had cartoon bears on them. A little girl trying so hard to be a woman; or a girl, older than she should be, reaching back for childhood?

  I stepped out of the truck to show I would follow her if she tried to go into the store. She got the message and stood beside the car.

  “I need you to tell me about the man called Leech.”

  “My mother told me not to talk to you about things. She said I didn’t have to unless she was around.” She spit the words out quickly and without thought. She had practiced saying them, I was sure.

  “It’s true,” I told her. “You don’t have to talk unless we make it all official and bring you in and call your parents.” I let that sink in a moment before continuing. “Is that what you want? Or would you like to help me find out what happened to your friend?”