Coffin Man

by James D. Doss

  I should’ve known. Moon groaned. “Which is?”

  “Assisting the chief of police with a minor little matter.” Parris pointed at the curb, where a sizable stream was washing the gutter clean of cigarette butts, MacDonald’s paper cups, and miscellaneous other refuse, debris, and detritus. “Park your gas hog right there by the No Parking sign, get into my unit, and I’ll tell you all about it.”

  Moon hesitated. “I really need to be getting home, pardner. Aunt Daisy and Sarah are expecting me for supper. Not only that, there’s firewood to be chopped and hogs to be slopped and—”

  Parris snorted at this unseemly display of domestic sentiment. “A peaceful home life is for sissies, Chucky.” The ex-Chicago cop flashed his toothy grin again. “Come along with your carefree bachelor buddy and we’ll have us a fine old time. Why, it might even turn out to be the beginning of a ripsnorting adventure.”

  “That’s more or less what I’d like to avoid.” But the speed-demon outlaw parked his car, pulled on a scuffed leather jacket, popped a black John B. Stetson lid onto his head, and sprinted to the GCPD unit, where a wide-open passenger-side door was ready to gobble him up.

  As Scott Parris eased the gleaming black-and-white along Copper Street, Charlie Moon buckled himself in and settled his long, lanky frame into the form-fitting seat.

  The GCPD chief of police, who should have known better, waited for his occasional deputy to ask, What’s this all about?

  Staring straight ahead through the rain-streaked windshield, the taciturn Indian watched the wiper smear an oily spot into a gossamer-thin film of rainbow sheen.

  “So,” Parris said with an expectant lift of his chin. “I bet you’re wondering what this is all about.” He thought he heard the Ute grunt.

  Genuinely disinterested in whatever his friend had up his sleeve, Moon was trying to remember the process by which molecular films (whose thicknesses are comparable to the wavelengths of the visible spectrum) perform the magic of separating white light into its constituent colors. Seems to me that the thinner parts of the oil film make purple light and the thicker parts red. But that didn’t help much because … It’s hard to tell which parts of the oil slick are thick and which are thin.

  The white cop tried again. “About half an hour ago, Clara took a call from a concerned citizen who insisted that I come see her, but the lady wouldn’t say what the problem was.”

  Clara Tavishuts was, like Charlie Moon, a Southern Ute. She was also GCPD’s senior dispatcher. With three hungry children and a sickly mother to support, the widow routinely worked two eight-hour shifts for the overtime pay.

  The ardent angler baited his barbed hook and made another toss: “And get this—the caller said I should bring Charlie Moon with me.”

  Mr. Moon didn’t bite.

  Parris shot the dark, silent man a barbed glance. “Am I boring you, Charlie?”

  “Not a bit, pardner.” Moon’s eye caught a glimpse of iridescent green on the greasy windshield. “I’m hanging on every word you say.”

  “Good.” The chief of police switched on his emergency lights to startle an eighty-year-old lady who was creeping along at fifteen miles per hour. Expecting to be arrested and handcuffed for some obscure infraction, the alarmed senior citizen immediately pulled to the curb. She was enormously relieved when the blue-and-red lights were extinguished and the cop car zoomed past her.

  Charlie Moon was sorely tempted to remind the driver that flashing lights were to be used only when a GCPD unit was involved in bona fide police business. And on top of that, Scott Parris was now zipping along Arapaho Avenue at fifty miles per hour, which was fifteen notches in excess of the posted speed limit. In the interest of tact, he withheld comment. But the deputy did lean sideways to take a look at the speedometer.

  They had been friends for a long time. “Don’t say it, Charlie.”

  “My lips are stapled shut.”

  Parris slowed to thirty-five and exhaled a sigh that fogged his side of the windshield. He switched on the defroster. “Spit out the staples and ask me who the caller was.”

  “Okay.” Moon lips came very near grinning. “Who the caller was, pard?”

  “Wanda Naranjo.”

  The Indian’s almost-grin was replaced with a thoughtful frown. “Am I supposed to know the lady?”

  “She apparently knows you.” Parris swerved to miss a potbellied beagle trailed by three fat puppies. “And that every once in a while, you act as my deputy.”

  Moon searched his memory. There are some Naranjos in Ignacio, but I don’t recall a Wanda. “Did the caller say why she wanted you to bring me along?”

  “Yes, she did.” Parris turned onto Rodeo Road. “Mrs. Naranjo told Clara that us paleface Anglo cops are worth about as much a thimble full of lizard spit. Said she wanted Charlie Moon to come take care of things.”

  The Southern Ute tribal investigator was beginning to get a glimmer. “Was the caller an Indian?”

  “Half Indian.” Parris nodded at the dark ribbon of road ahead. “Clara tells me that Wanda Naranjo’s mother was from one of those pueblos down in New Mexico.” He tried to remember which one. It wasn’t Taos Pueblo … or Santa Clara. “So, the citizen being half Indian and asking for you personally, I didn’t know how I could say no.”

  “It’s a simple single-syllable word, pard.”

  “So’s yes,” Parris shot back. “And I’m a positive kinda guy. So I phoned the Columbine and found out you was in town, picking up some nuts and bolts at ABC Hardware. But when I called ABC, they said you’d left almost an hour ago.” When Moon didn’t ask how Parris had tailed him to Copper Street, the copper told him. “Officer Martin spotted you leaving Fast Eddie’s Barbershop, so I hit the street and was all over you like ugly on a warthog.” To make way for some unpleasant news, he cleared his throat. “Turns out Wanda Naranjo has an interesting history.”

  Moon grinned at the euphemism. “So the lady’s a troublemaker?”

  “Only from time to time.” Parris slowed to the speed limit. “A couple of years ago, Mrs. Naranjo drove over to Big Moe’s Stop ’N Shop at about two A.M., barged in like Calamity Jane on a ripsnortin’ rampage, banged her fist on the counter—and demanded a six-pack of RC Cola and a half-dozen MoonPies.”

  “Not my notion of an early breakfast, but it don’t sound like an overly serious misdemeanor.”

  “She was not there to make a purchase, Charlie.”

  “You telling me she was holding up the joint for a postmidnight snack?”

  “Not like any respectable felon—the lady wasn’t toting a smokin’ Saturday-night special or waving a bloody machete.”

  “I like it—tell me more, pard.”

  “Mrs. Naranjo was armed with a Bic cigarette lighter, which she flicked on and held under Big Moe’s chin. She told him that if he didn’t hand over the colas and sugar cakes muy pronto she’d set his beard afire.”

  “I don’t like to step on another man’s story, Scott—but this strikes me as highly unlikely. Unless my memory is on vacation, the proprietor of that convenience store don’t have a hair anywhere on his face.”

  “You recollect correctly, Chuck. But that’s the very threat Mrs. Naranjo made.”

  “Was the lady under the influence of some mind-bending substance?”

  “Not so far as we know.”

  “So did Big Moe disarm the unruly customer?”

  “Nope. The sensible proprietor called GCPD and in two minutes flat Eddie Knox and E. C. Slocum showed up, sized up the situation, and did their duty as sworn officers of the law.”

  Moon grinned. “Slocum cuffed the lady, and Eddie beat her senseless with his five-cell flashlight?”

  The chief of police was about to chuckle when he recalled several of the Knox/Slocum team’s previous misadventures. “My fearless GCPD boys in blue relieved the citizen of the potentially lethal cigarette lighter, took her home, and tucked her into bed. The next day when she came to retrieve her vehicle from the convenience store
parking lot, Mrs. Naranjo apologized to Moe and swore on a stack of TV Guides that she couldn’t recall a thing about what’d happened last night.”

  “Sounds like the lady’s a certifiable somnambulist.”

  “She might be a registered Rosicrucian for all I know, but Big Moe and Eddie and E.C. concluded that she was sleepwalking when she showed up at the Stop ’N Shop.”

  “Now that you mention it, I guess that possibility can’t be entirely ruled out.”

  “Point is, Charlie—the Naranjo woman has more than a few screws loose, so we’ll need to take that factoid into account.”

  “Thanks for the heads-up, pard—I’ll keep the lady’s nighttime meanderings in mind—and if she pulls a cigarette lighter on me I’ll be gone so fast I’ll leave my shadow behind.”

  As they passed the fairgrounds, where the Granite Creek Rodeo put on a big show every time August rolled around, Charlie Moon could barely make out the grandstands overlooking the muddy arena where pretty cowgirls roped calves and flirted with hard-muscled young men who did their level best to stay on the backs of wild-eyed bucking horses and mean-as-hell Brahma bulls. The rancher interlaced his long fingers across a silver belt buckle he’d won in the Ignacio All-Indian Rodeo almost twenty years ago. In damp weather, like right now, he could still feel the soreness in his left ribs and hip joint where the piebald bronc had pitched him sky-high one second flat after the buzzer—and on his way down to the ground had said “howdy” with an iron-shod hoof. Moon figured the game had been worth the pain. And if I was young and dumb enough, I’d do it all over again.

  CHAPTER NINE

  A WOMAN WITH BIG TROUBLES

  Slowing his black-and-white to a creep, Scott Parris switched on the spotlight and swept the beam along the sidewalk until it illuminated a sheltered bus stop that resembled an oversize telephone booth. “The driveway to the Naranjo residence is supposed to be a little ways down the road from here—hey, there it is!” He turned into the rutted, muddy lane just a tad too fast and gave the V-8 engine just a little too much gas. As the sleek police car began to slip and slide thisaway and thataway, he shifted down. But, like any red-blooded American male, the driver knew it wasn’t his fault and was quick to make the point: “This dirt track needs a coupla truckloads of gravel.” The instant the Chevy gave up fishtailing and began rolling along in a more or less straight line, Parris barreled ahead, kicking up mud and casting aspersions on “this so-called driveway.” Braking to a sliding stop at the shabby house, the annoyed driver upped his gravel estimate to a dozen truckloads. “And that’s just for filling the knee-deep mud holes!”

  Charlie Moon held his tongue and enjoyed the minor episode.

  Shrugging out of his yellow slicker, Parris donned his shiny black leather jacket and the cherished felt fedora his daddy had worn in the 1940s. The chief of police adjusted the rearview mirror, switched on the dome light, and eyed a ruddy face that grinned back at him. Rain or shine, a man wanted to look fine when meeting a lady. Especially a lady who figured he was worth a minuscule portion of lizard spit.

  Whether or not Wanda Naranjo was a lady in the strictest sense of that descriptor, she did appreciate men, and she was delighted to see the cop car in her yard.

  When Moon and Parris saw her short, stocky presence framed in the dimly lighted doorway, Betty’s mother appeared to be dressed for a long walk in the chill, late-afternoon rain, but … put that on hold. We shall defer to the woman, who prefers to explain the situation herself. As she does, we hope that Scott Parris will listen carefully, and that Charlie Moon will show as much interest in Wanda’s story as he does to oil smears on wet windshields. Experienced officers of the law are supposed to notice the most subtle hint of something amiss.

  If Parris and Moon had paid very close attention to everything they would see during the following hour, and listened carefully to every word uttered by the distraught mother, the lawmen might have figured out what had happened right off the bat. But they wouldn’t and didn’t. Why? Like others of their prideful gender, these happy comrades hate to admit to the least shortcoming—and we are not in the finger-pointing business. Blame it on distractions.

  HELP WANTED: ABLE-BODIED MAN WITH TOOL BOX

  Wanda Naranjo was outfitted in a black woolen overcoat, a scruffy navy-blue sock hat that was pulled down past her ears, and garish yellow galoshes that matched the slicker Scott Parris had left in the car. She admitted the lawmen without a word of greeting and slammed the door against the chill, damp air flooding in from the front porch. The atmosphere inside her home was almost as cold and definitely as humid.

  As the western gentlemen removed their hats, Parris introduced himself and his part-time deputy.

  Wanda eyed the tall, slender Ute. “I appreciate you coming all the way out here to help me.” She shot a quick glance at the paleface chief of police. “Oh, and you too.”

  After Mr. Lizard Spit had shaken the rain off his old fedora, he took a look at the woman’s coat, hat, and boots. “Been out in the rain?”

  Betty Naranjo’s mother shook her head. “If you fellas hadn’t shown up, I guess I might have gone outside to look for…” But she wasn’t quite ready to tell them about her missing daughter. Wanda would have to work her way up to that dismal task, and she hoped that before she did, Betty would come walking through the door with a big lie to explain her late return. The nurse’s aide pointed at the kitchen. “I got home from work this morning to find out that Mike didn’t fix the leak under the sink so we had an argument and he left.” Wanda was sorely tempted to enlarge on the only bright spot in her miserable day, but thought it unwise to boast about how she had motivated Kauffmann’s hasty departure.

  Parris and Moon exchanged wary glances and shared identical thoughts: Surely she didn’t call us out here to fix her plumbing. But both lawmen had answered far stranger calls than that.

  “I called a plumber.” She sighed. “The fella said he’d be here right away—but you know how those guys are.”

  The white cop responded in a soothing tone, “Plumber’s minutes tend to stretch out into hours.”

  Wanda Naranjo seemed not to hear. “Not long after I made the call, I fell asleep on the couch. If the plumber did show up, he didn’t knock hard enough on the door to wake me up.”

  “Forget about that no-show plumber.” Moon flashed a hundred-kilowatt smile at the woman. “I’ll take care of that water leak.”

  Afraid to hope, Wanda Naranjo stared in disbelief. “D’you think you might be able fix it?”

  Feigning an injured expression, the amateur plumber looked down his nose. “With three hands and a foot tied behind my back.”

  The doubtful lady forced a smile. He’ll probably break a pipe and cause a flood that’d sink Noah’s Ark. But she liked a man who was sure of himself.

  Scott Parris rolled his blue eyes. Big show-off. And that wasn’t all that galled him. One way or another, Granite Creek’s top cop always ended up playing his deputy’s sidekick. Here we go again, Charlie’s the Lone Ranger and I’m Tonto. The eye roller grinned. But if a seasoned pro knows his role and plays it best as he can, someday maybe he’ll get to be leading man. “I’ll go get the toolbox out of my unit.”

  Which he did, and did a fine job backing up the star of the minor melodrama.

  While the chief of police knelt on the wet kitchen linoleum and aimed a skull-cracker flashlight to illuminate the damp situation, Charlie Moon managed to get the upper half of his skinny frame under Wanda Naranjo’s double sink, which was almost as old as Aunt Daisy. For a dozen heartbeats, the Indian was dead silent. On beat number thirteen, he said, “Hand me the Vise-Grips, pard—and the adjustable wrench.”

  Scott Parris passed the specified tools to the hopeful plumber.

  As the next several minutes passed irreversibly into that dark void we call history, Moon uttered a grunt or two. Maybe three. He also shifted himself into another position. Asked for the five-cell flashlight and got it.

  “There,” the
repairman said.

  Wanda clapped her hands. “Did you stop the water from dripping?”

  “Yep. It was just a loose fitting.” Moon came scooting out from under the sink, his face and new white shirt spotted with greasy goop. He gave the woman of the house an apologetic look. “It’s not what you’d call a professional job, but it oughta hold for a little while.” He added this helpful advice: “There’s a lot of old, corroded pipes under there, ma’am—you’d better get a real plumber out here before one of ’em springs another leak.”

  Before he could get off the floor, the happy little woman embraced her hero, found a goop-free spot on his forehead, and kissed it. “Oh, you’re so sweet.” When all seven feet of the Ute had unfolded like a carpenter’s rule and Moon was towering over her, Wanda added, “And you’re a real handyman—I should’ve called you instead of the other guy.” She winked. “Is your number in the book?”

  “Sure it is.” Parris snickered. “Just look under Columbine Ranch.”

  Neither the woman nor the white cop could see the blush on the Ute’s dark face, but they knew it was there.

  Wanda began to dab at Moon with a wet dishrag. I bet this one’s got a dozen girlfriends who’d like to keep house for him.

  The lonely rancher seemed oblivious to the filth.

  She shook her head at his shirt. “That’s probably ruined, but take it off and I’ll throw it in the washing machine.”

  Mr. Moon demurred. “Oh, we won’t be here long enough for that, ma’am.”

  “That’s right,” Parris said. “We showed up because you called 911 and insisted on seeing me and Charlie Moon.” The cop’s expression was deadly serious. And if you called us all the way out here to fix your leaky pipes, I’ll file charges against you so fast it’ll make your silly head spin. Then again … That’d make great newspaper headlines. Scott Parris knew he’d never live it down. I’d get laughed right out of town.