One Tough Texan

by MJ Rodgers

  Matt certainly wouldn’t have picked this as Jamie’s hometown. She possessed a classy elegance and self-assurance that seemed at odds with whatever this place had to offer.

  “Where do your foster folks live?” he asked.

  “They don’t live here anymore. Take the next left. I’ll show you where Tony’s family stayed.”

  Matt followed Jamie’s directions and found himself drifting into a more residential section of town, greener and cleaner than the main street. He turned down Kleinman Lane at Jamie’s signal.

  The homes lining the block were small and modest and about twenty years old—all except for one on the very end.

  It was an elaborate Victorian shingle, two stories with latticed attic windows, a balcony off the second floor, and a gambrel roof reminiscent of late 19th-century architecture. The nicely landscaped lot around it was at least three times the size of any other.

  “That’s not the one,” Jamie said, obviously having caught the direction of Matt’s eyes. “Tony’s house was this one, here.”

  She was pointing to one of the more modest homes halfway up the block. Matt pulled his car to the curb, but left the engine running. All the house told him was that the Lagarrigues were middle-class in terms of this town.

  “Who lived in that big Victorian?” he asked, pointing to it.

  “The Kleinmans,” Jamie said.

  “Did the Lagarrigues rent?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Maybe the local real-estate office can tell us. I didn’t see a sign for one as we drove through town. Do you know where it is?”

  “When I was here, the sheriff’s deputy also had himself the real-estate license.”

  “Where was his office?”

  “One street south of Main next to the library. It’s probably still there. Nothing much changes in a town like this.”

  Jamie was right. The sign said Sweetspring Realty and Sheriffs Deputy. It was clear to Matt which occupation was foremost in the mind of the occupant.

  Matt parked the car. The minute he stepped out to circle around to let Jamie out, he got a whiff of the feedlot.

  Matt had been born and. reared on a ranch. He’d gotten used to all kinds of smells. But he had to admit, Jamie hadn’t exaggerated this one.

  They found Deputy Plotnik sitting behind his gray metal desk, a telephone sticking out of his ear and a Polaroid picture of three homes pinned up on a corkboard behind him. Soon as he saw Matt and Jamie step inside, he cut his conversation short.

  “Gotta go, Maylene.” He hung up the phone and rose to his feet with a big smile.

  “Well, howdy. And how you folks today?” he said eagerly, as he hitched his pants up over his hefty belly.

  Plotnik was fleshy faced, about forty-five and balding just a bit. Matt knew he had clearly mistaken them for prospective real-estate buyers.

  And despite the fact that he’d included Matt in his greeting, the deputy clearly only had eyes for Jamie.

  Matt didn’t blame him none. He couldn’t imagine a man in his right mind who wouldn’t prefer looking at her. He held out his hand. “I’m Matt Bonner. And this is—”

  “Mrs. Bonner,” Jamie said quickly.

  Matt looked over at her in surprise. He’d never expected that Jamie would introduce herself that way.

  “Well, Mr. and Mrs. Bonner, now you just set yourselves level in those chairs and tell me what I can do you for,” Deputy Plotnik said, beaming happily as he pointed to a couple of worn wooden specimens in front of his desk.

  Matt and Jamie sat. Plotnik was trying real hard not to stare at Jamie. He obviously didn’t want to offend Matt, since it was also obvious he thought Jamie was his wife. But Matt could tell it was taking a lot of the deputy’s effort to be polite about it.

  “I’m a private investigator,” Matt said, pulling his identification out of his wallet and handing it to Plotnik. “We’re here to consult you in your capacity as deputy, not real-estate agent”

  Plotnik’s smile dribbled into disappointment. He took a good look at Matt’s ID before handing it back. Then he eyed Matt a moment more before leaning back in his squeaky chair and sticking out his stomach.

  “Who you looking for?”

  “A family who lived here briefly fifteen years ago. Name of Lagarrigue.”

  “Why you looking for ‘em?”

  “They appear to have some relatives in Louisiana who never even knew about them,” Jamie said, before Matt could respond. “Sweetspring is the only lead we have.”

  Matt once again looked over at Jamie. She was just full of surprises today.

  “You and your husband work on investigating together?” Plotnik asked.

  “Not on every case,” Jamie said. “But this one has become special to me. We’d sure appreciate any help you could give us.”

  And Deputy Plotnik was sure appreciating that smile Jamie was giving him. He leaned forward in his chair.

  “Yep, I remember the Lagarrigues all right,” Plotnik said. “He sold life insurance. They had a boy, high-school age. I arranged for them to rent the Mason house while the Masons were up visiting their new granddaughter in Oklahoma. The Lagarrigues were going to buy their own place in town and settle in Sweetspring. They weren’t Texan, of course. But nice enough folks.”

  “You have a remarkable memory, Deputy,” Matt said.

  “I’ve been the law here in town for close to twenty-five years. Nothing gets past this old boy. I know’d everybody who’s been and gone. Besides, the Lagarrigues were here during the time of the murder, and that sort of makes everything around it stick in a man’s mind.”

  Matt came forward in his chair. “The murder?” he repeated.

  Chapter Six

  Deputy Plotnik rubbed his hands together in obvious anticipation.

  “Y’all don’t know about the murder? Biggest thing that ever hit this town, I can tell you. Up until that time, all the peacemaking I had to do was keeping the cowboys from stomping each other too hard when they come in to whoop it up on Saturday nights.”

  “Who was murdered?” Matt asked.

  “Kyle Kleinman, richest man in these parts. He owned the feedlot on the west end of town. Left a widow and a boy. Real sad thing, that. Wrey never did get over his daddy’s death. I’ve had to make a lot of allowances for that boy over the years.”

  “How did the murder happen?” Matt asked.

  “Kyle come home to surprise a burglar. He and the missus was over chaperoning a dance at the school. Kyle gave it up early and walked on home to get a whiskey. Kyle was a man who liked his booze. Naturally, no alcoholic beverages were allowed on the school grounds.”

  “What happened when he surprised the burglar?” Matt asked, wondering why Jamie had said nothing about this.

  “Kyle got a round off at the guy with his shotgun. Not that it did any good. Dang fool never could hit the broad side of a barn. Only went hunting with him once. He come near to shooting me!”

  “What happened after Kyle shot at the burglar?” Matt prodded.

  “Well, way I figure it, must have been a struggle. ‘Cause Kyle ended up dead. The murderer hightailed it out the back of the house, leaving everything he’d sacked up to steal.”

  “What kinds of things?” Matt asked.

  Plotnik scratched his chin. “Don’t rightly recall. But some nice stuff. The Kleinmans were well off. Still are. Only now there’s just the widow, Wrey and Wrey’s wife, of course.”

  “Did his family find him when they returned home?”

  “No. Neighbors found old Kyle with his throat cut just a minute or so after the deed was done. Before that, folks never even locked their doors around this town.”

  “Did you find the murderer?”

  “Not fast enough.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Oh, I know’d who did it. But before I got the evidence to prove it, he was long gone.”

  “Who was it?”

  “A no-count, name of Lester Wilson. He’d just come home t
o Sweetspring after doing a two-year stretch for a robbery in San Angelo. Bad seed clear through.”

  “He was a resident of Sweetspring before he went to jail?” Matt asked.

  “Not in town proper. He was part of some trash down the road a piece. He’d been camping out near the creek since his return. He was just out of the town’s limits or I would have run him off. And the rest of them, too. Anyway, Lester went over to the feedlot looking for a job. Kyle told him he didn’t hire no ex-cons. Lester cussed Kyle out”

  Plotnik paused to lean back again in his chair. “Next thing we knew Kyle was getting his throat cut. Didn’t take being bent over double in intellect to know’d who’d done it.”

  “I thought you said Kyle surprised a burglar?” Matt said.

  “Way I figure it, Lester was just planning on robbing him at first. But Kyle come home unexpected like and then started shooting, so Lester jumped him and cut him.”

  “The evidence supported that?” Matt asked.

  “Not right off. When we found Lester sleeping in the alley behind a bar the next morning, only blood on him was his own, from a fist fight he had with a couple of cowboys.”

  “You have a forensic lab in town?”

  “Naw. Sheriff came in from the county seat and had the boys from his lab take the samples, real official like. Now, you cut a man’s throat, Mr. Bonner, you wear his blood. Those lab boys couldn’t find a trace of Kyle’s blood on Lester. So there it was. We had no knife. We had no bloody clothes. That boy was just as crafty as a coyote in covering his tracks.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said he was in that bar when Kyle got it.”

  “But you didn’t believe him.”

  “Nobody in that bar could say when Lester came in that night. Way I figure, Lester cut Kyle and then lit out the back of the house when the neighbors come running to investigate the shooting. I figure he washed off in the creek, changed clothes, hid the bloody ones where we’d never find them and went to pick a fight with a couple of cowboys in a bar so’s he could get that alibi of his.”

  “What happened to Lester?”

  “I kept him in jail until the forensic reports came back. Then I had to let him loose.”

  “Where did he go?”

  “San Angelo. He knew better than to stay around this town. Feelings were running pretty high. Folks were talking about lynching him, proof or no proof.”

  “You said you did find evidence later?”

  “Three months later a couple of kids came across the knife buried in the creek mud, right near where Lester had been camping. Lab boys said it had Kyle’s blood on it all right. Lester had sunk it in that mud to hide it. Trouble was by then Lester was long gone. Damn, if this town didn’t blame me for it, too. But, hell, I couldn’t keep him in jail until I could find some proof. Law don’t work that way.”

  “Did you ever catch up with Lester?”

  “Naw. He got himself killed in a holdup a year later. The way most folks figure it, though, justice got done.”

  “We’ve strayed from the subject of the Lagarrigues, Deputy Plotnik,” Jamie said.

  “It probably seems that way, ma’am,” Plotnik said, “but it does all tie in with the Lagarrigues.”

  “How’s that?” Matt asked.

  “Well, the murder was why they left. No more than a day or so later, old Oscar come to see me and said he wasn’t going to be staying in town no more. This whole thing about Kyle getting killed had spooked his wife good. And if truth be told, it appeared to me as though it had spooked Oscar good, too.”

  “He was afraid?” Jamie asked.

  “Couldn’t blame him none, ma’am. He was one of them neighbors who heard Kyle’s shotgun and come running. Got to Kyle’s place right after Old Man Sistern and his son, Judd. Judd runs the town’s newspaper. So he was right glad to be on the scene so soon. But not poor Lagarrigue. Not a nice thing to see, a man’s throat cut. Particularly when you ain’t born with a strong Texas stomach.”

  “Where did the Lagarrigues go when they left here?” Matt asked.

  “Back east, I reckon. Yeah, now as I recall Oscar did mention something about his company arranging for him to take a desk job.”

  “What was the name of the insurance company he worked for?” Matt asked.

  “He never told me. I had to charge them a full month’s rent, but they didn’t squawk none. His wife even thanked me, she was so scared. Her face weren’t much to look at, but she had real pretty red hair and she were real polite.”

  “Do you remember her name?”

  “Gotta have it around here some place.”

  Deputy Plotnik turned his chair around and rummaged through a two-drawer file cabinet with Real Estate written on a three-by-five card in front of it. After a minute he pulled out a manila folder and turned back to plop it on his desk. He opened the folder and shifted through its contents. Matt was aware Jamie was giving them a once-over from her vantage point He was studying them, too.

  “Yep, here it is. Oscar and Erline. Tony was their boy. No pets. No trouble. Left the place real clean. No forwarding address.”

  “Did they pay by check?” Matt asked.

  “Nope. Cash.” Plotnik closed the folder. “Sorry I can’t be of more help, folks.”

  Matt thanked Deputy Plotnik, and he and Jamie left. As soon as they were back in the car, he started up the engine and put on the air conditioner. After a breath or two of somewhat cleaner air, he turned to Jamie.

  “It would have been helpful if you had told me that you intended to hide the fact that you come from this town,” he said.

  “I wasn’t thinking about your having to introduce me,

  Matt. I realize now I should have, but I wasn’t.”

  “Is it just the deputy that you plan to keep in the dark?”

  “I’d prefer everyone we talk to here knows me simply as Mrs. Bonner. I’m not telling a lie.’ My name still is Mrs. Bonner, if I care to use it.”

  “You told Plotnik a lie when you said that relatives in Louisiana were looking for the Lagarrigues.”

  “I didn’t actually say they were looking for them. If you’ll recall, I said the Louisiana Lagarrigues didn’t know the Texas ones existed. And that’s true.”

  “Why the subterfuge? Why don’t you want these folks to know who you are?”

  “I wasn’t even the person the people in this town thought I was fifteen years ago. Reminding them of that inaccurate memory wouldn’t help them to see me as who I am today.”

  “Someone’s bound to recognize you sooner or later.”

  Her laugh surprised him. “No. I seriously doubt that. Deputy Plotnik saw a lot of me during that time. You were just a witness to the fact that he didn’t recognize me, despite his brag about knowing everyone who’s been in or out of this town.”

  “Did you have plastic surgery?”

  “No, something far more effective and life altering.”

  “And what would that be?”

  She turned to smile at him. “The freedom to be who I am.”

  Her blue eyes held a lovely light when she said those words.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about the murder?” he asked.

  She looked away from him, straight out the windshield. The frown returned in full force to her brow.

  “It didn’t have anything to do with Tony. There was no reason to.”

  “It was the reason the Lagarrigues left town.”

  “I didn’t know that until Deputy Plotnik told us just now.”

  “The murder happened on that night he took you to the dance, didn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was the reason Tony gave you for leaving town?”

  “He didn’t. A few days later he was just…gone.”

  Matt studied her lovely face, once again seeing that unmistakable haunted look in her eyes that appeared whenever she talked about Tony leaving.

  Damn it. How good could one kiss have been? Or had it been more than just one
kiss?

  Matt gunned the engine and pulled away from the curb, more than disturbed by the rushing train of that thought.

  “Where’s the newspaper office?”

  “It’s next to the post office. Why?”

  “I want to read about what was going on in the town during the time the Lagarrigues were here. And I’d also like to talk to Old Man Sistern and his son, Judd.”

  “I told you the murder has nothing to do with finding Tony.”

  “Oscar Lagarrigue moved his family out of town because of it. At least, the murder was the reason he gave.”

  “You say that as though you think there was another reason.”

  “Jamie, doesn’t it seem peculiar that Deputy Plotnik didn’t know what insurance company Oscar Lagarrigue worked for?”

  “Not particularly. Why?”

  “Ask yourself this. If you were a life-insurance salesman, who would you be pitching your product to?”

  “Just about anyone I met, I suppose. Oh, I see. You’re thinking that Oscar should have tried to sell Deputy Plotnik some life insurance. What makes you so sure he didn’t?”

  “Because Plotnik said Oscar didn’t even mention his company’s name. The first thing a life-insurance salesman does is tout the reliable reputation of the company he represents. The next thing he does is hand you his card.”

  “So why didn’t Oscar Lagarrigue try to sell Deputy Plotnik some life insurance?”

  “That’s what I’m wondering about. Now, where’s the newspaper office?”

  “It’s three blocks down and two over. I’ll show you where to turn.”

  Matt opened the door to the newspaper office for Jamie a few minutes later. They stepped into the large window-lit room to find it contained an old-fashioned printing press and a short, chubby, mustached man whom they had interrupted setting type by hand. He was dark, in his late forties. He looked up at them with unabashed interest.

  “Something I can help you folks with?” he asked, wiping his hands on his black apron.

  Matt introduced Jamie as Mrs. Bonner and then handed the newspaperman his card.

  “Well, well,” he said. “A San Antonio private investigator.” He held out an ink-stained hand and Matt shook it. “I’m Judd Sistern, Mr. Bonner, editor of the Sweetspring Star. She’s not big-time, but she’s all mine.”