by Bill Crider
“So it’ll all work out,” Hack said.
“Sure it will,” Rhodes told him. He just wished he believed it.
Chapter 14
Munday left the jail with a satisfied smile. Rhodes figured Munday had a good story for his program tomorrow, and he didn’t have to bother checking to see if it was true because he wasn’t a reporter. Munday claimed that he was an entertainer and that entertainers didn’t have to worry about accuracy. Accuracy wasn’t the point.
Just what the point was, other than to get an audience, Rhodes wasn’t sure, but whatever it was, it worked. Munday was right about one thing: He had a lot of listeners.
“You think he’ll bond the Eccleses out?” Hack asked when the door closed behind Munday.
“Not a chance,” Rhodes said.
“I’ll bet they asked him, though.”
Rhodes had had the same thought. “The judge hasn’t even set the bail yet.”
“Don’t matter,” Lawton said, coming in after returning the cousins to their cell. “They’d ask him anyway. It’s just the way they are.”
“I think I’ll talk to them one more time,” Rhodes said. “Maybe they’ll feel more like talking now that they’ve had their meeting with Munday.”
“You really think so?” Hack asked.
“No,” Rhodes said, “but I’m going to give it a try, anyway.”
He went back to the cellblock and found the cousins sitting on the bottom bunk with expectant looks, as if they had been waiting for him.
“You gonna listen to Munday’s show tomorrow, Sheriff?” Lance asked. “Gonna be a good ’un.”
“I don’t have time to listen,” Rhodes said.
“Gonna miss some good stuff,” Hugh said, elbowing Lance and grinning.
“Munday’s not going to bond you out,” Rhodes said, “if that’s what you’re hoping. We might be able to work a deal, though.”
Hugh quit grinning. “What kind of deal?”
“You tell me what I want to know, and I’ll see about dropping the charges against you.”
“We got nothin’ to tell,” Hugh said. “Right, Lance?”
“Right,” Lance said. “Whatever you think we saw, we didn’t see it.”
“It’s about my bedtime,” Hugh said, and he climbed into the upper bunk and lay down.
It was still daylight outside, but that didn’t seem to bother the cousins.
“’Night, Lance,” Hugh said.
“’Night,” Lance said, and he lay down, too.
“’Night, John Boy,” Rhodes said.
“Who the hell is John Boy?” Lance asked.
Rhodes was already on the way out of the cellblock.
“You wouldn’t know him,” he said.
* * *
Ruth was telling Hack about a defaced traffic sign when Rhodes returned.
“Spin tires on pavement?” Hack said. “That one’s nearly as old as I am.”
“Ain’t nothin’ that old,” Lawton said.
“You can’t talk. You’re older than I am.”
“Ain’t nobody older than you are.”
“You listen here,” Hack said, but Rhodes cut him off.
“Both of you hold on. How bad is the stop sign, Ruth?”
“Bad enough that it needs to be replaced,” Ruth said. “Either that or they need to paint over the words somebody put on it. They’re pretty small, so it should be easy enough.”
“I’ll call the city maintenance crew,” Hack said, forgetting about his discussion with Lawton. “They’ll take care of it.”
Hack turned to the phone, and Ruth asked Rhodes if there was anything new on the murders. He told her about Lance and Hugh and their meeting with Milton Munday.
“I’m going to listen to him tomorrow,” Ruth said. “It’ll be great.”
“That’s what Hugh and Lance said. Right now, though, I want you to see what you can find out about Ed Garver. Do a background check, and call Trey Allison at his plumbing business and see what he has to say.”
“You think Garver had something to do with the killings?”
“I just think we need to run a check on him. Rapinski mentioned him last night, and now Rapinski’s dead.”
Garver had also disappeared during the hunt at the time when Rapinski was killed, but Rhodes wasn’t ready to tell anyone that.
“Worth checking out, all right,” Ruth said. “I’ll get on it.”
“The maintenance crew’s on the way to replace the stop sign,” Hack said, hanging up the phone. “They’ll take in the old one and repaint it.”
Rhodes hadn’t written out his arrest report on Lance and Hugh, so he sat down at his desk to get started. He hadn’t gotten far when the phone rang.
Hack answered, listened, thanked someone, and hung up.
“You’re not gonna believe this,” Hack said.
“Try me,” Rhodes said.
“That was Miz Wilkie.”
“Uh-oh,” Rhodes said. “What does Mikey Burns want now?”
“It’s not Mikey.”
“What is it then?”
“Motorsickles,” Hack said. “She heard ’em buzz by the commissioner’s barn and went outside. She says it’s some people we know.”
“I was afraid of that,” Rhodes said.
“How come?”
“Rapinski,” Rhodes said. “If you were a biker and people didn’t call you Rapinski, they might give you a nickname.”
“Rapper,” Hack said.
“That would be my guess. I thought Rapinski looked like someone I knew. It was Rapper. They might be cousins like the Eccleses, or they might even be brothers.”
“You think he’s here to run his own investigation? Unofficial as it might be.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised.”
Rapper wasn’t the kind of person to waste any time on mourning. He’d prefer revenge, and it wouldn’t matter much to him who he took it out on. He might even blame Rhodes for Rapinski’s death.
“You’d think he’d have learned his lesson,” Hack said.
“Some people are hard to convince,” Rhodes said.
He and Rapper had met on more than one occasion when Rapper had decided to engage in criminal enterprises in Blacklin County. He’d tried selling and manufacturing drugs, and he’d even tried a little moonshining. He never came out the winner in his encounters with Rhodes, but he never quit trying. He’d lost a finger and part of an ear and suffered various other injuries, but so far he’d managed to avoid arrest. This time he might not be so lucky.
“That Rapper never learns,” Lawton said. “Is Nellie with him?”
Nellie always rode with Rapper. He was thinner and older, and he reminded Rhodes of some hapless movie sidekick from the days of B Westerns. Fuzzy St. John, maybe, or Fuzzy Knight. One of the Fuzzies, anyway.
“Wait till Munday hears about this,” Hack said. “What was that movie with Marlon Brando?”
“The Wild One,” Rhodes said.
“That’s the one. Munday’ll work this up into somethin’ like that, for sure.”
“Who’s going to tell him about Rapper?”
“Not me,” Lawton said, looking as pious as he could.
“Not me, either,” Hack said. “You don’t think we’d talk to that goober, do you?”
“He’ll find out easy enough,” Lawton said. “Rapper’s trouble, any way you slice him.”
“Sheriff’s sliced him a couple of times, all right,” Hack said.
“I haven’t sliced anybody,” Rhodes said.
“Stuck a hay hook in his leg, though,” Lawton said. “Shot off his ear. That’s bad enough.”
“Never mind that,” Rhodes said. “See if you can get Arvid Fowler on the phone.”
“Yes, sir, Sheriff,” Hack said.
He looked in the phone book and then dialed a number. After waiting a while, he took a pencil and scratched on a pad. Then he hung up.
“He’s not at his place. Must be out workin’. His answerin’ machine has his cell phone number
on it, so I wrote it down. You want me to try it?”
“Go ahead,” Rhodes said.
This time Hack got Fowler and told him the sheriff wanted to have a word with him. Rhodes picked up the phone on his desk and punched 2. When Fowler came on the line, Rhodes asked if he and the other men were going out to hunt hogs that night.
“We might,” Fowler said. “Why?”
“I think you ought to stay home for a while,” Rhodes said. “It’s getting dangerous out in the woods.”
“You got a point,” Fowler said. “That’s why we’re going to a different place next time. Whenever that is.”
Rhodes wasn’t sure how much Rapper knew about the hog hunts, or even if he knew anything about them. However, Lawton was right about how easy it would be for him to find out. The biker had plenty of sources of information in the county. A number of people lived a sort of off-the-grid life out in the country, and Rapper was bound to know some of them. Some of the ones he knew would also know about the hunts and where the hunters would be.
“Anywhere you go might be too dangerous,” Rhodes said.
Fowler was skeptical. “What’re you trying to tell me, Sheriff?”
“That there might be someone who’s not interested so much in finding out who killed those two men as he is in getting a little revenge. It won’t matter to him who he gets it from, either.”
“You got somebody specific in mind?”
“You wouldn’t know him,” Rhodes said. “He rides a motorcycle.”
“I know a few folks like that.”
“Name’s Rapper,” Rhodes said.
Fowler was quiet for a couple of seconds. “Don’t know him. He from around here?”
“Not exactly,” Rhodes said. “He’s been here before, though.”
“Well, he won’t bother me and the boys. We’re not scared of real hogs, and we’re not scared of anybody who rides a metal one.”
“Maybe you should be.”
“You don’t worry about us, Sheriff. We got guns. We can take care of ourselves.”
“That’s what Rapinski thought.”
“Don’t try to scare me, Sheriff.”
“All right,” Rhodes said. “Just tell me where you’ll be tonight.”
“Out around Milsby. The old Carroll place.”
Rhodes knew where that was. In fact, it wasn’t far from where Mrs. Wilkie lived, and that wasn’t good. Rapper and Nellie often stayed out in that area.
“You be careful,” Rhodes said. “Watch your back.”
“I always do,” Fowler said and hung up. So did Rhodes.
“You think he’s gonna be careful?” Hack asked.
“Not for a minute,” Rhodes said.
* * *
Rhodes went home, and as soon as he walked in the door, Ivy said, “All right, what happened?”
Yancey charged in from somewhere, his toenails clicking on the hardwood. He jumped up and down at Rhodes’s feet, yipping in such excitement that he might not have seen Rhodes for several years instead of just hours. Rhodes wondered if the dog had ratted him out.
“What happened?” Rhodes asked.
Ivy looked around, then turned back to Rhodes. “I never noticed that echo in here before.”
Rhodes grinned. “I didn’t mean to repeat the question. I just wanted to know what you were talking about.”
“You know what I’m talking about, all right. There’s mud on the bathroom floor.”
“Oh,” Rhodes said. He thought he’d cleaned up, but he must have missed a spot or two. He’d have to be more careful.
“Your towel’s wet, and someone’s been using the washer,” Ivy said, “and I smell gun oil.”
“Have you ever thought about joining the sheriff’s department?” Rhodes asked. “I could make you an investigator.”
“I’d be good at it, too, but you haven’t answered the question.”
“I got wet,” Rhodes said. He looked down at Yancey, who was still excited. “Muddy, too.”
“Are you going to tell me about it?”
“Sure. Let’s go in the kitchen. I could use a drink.”
They went into the kitchen, and Rhodes got a Dr Pepper from the refrigerator. He ordered the soft drinks from Dublin, Texas, on the Internet. Dr Pepper made with real sugar. The real thing. Rhodes wasn’t big on alcohol, but he did love Dr Pepper.
He popped the can and went to the table. Ivy was already sitting there. Sam watched from his usual spot by the refrigerator, his yellow eyes alert. Yancey looked in from the doorway, not sure whether to risk coming in when the cat was so wide-awake.
Rhodes held up the can before he sat down. “You want one?”
“I don’t think so. I just want to hear the story.”
Rhodes sat down and told her. She laughed now and then, and when he was finished, she said, “I’ve decided I don’t want to be an investigator. I’ve got something better in mind.”
“What’s that?” Rhodes asked.
“I want to be the department videographer. I’ll follow you around with a video camera. We’ll get rich selling things to that TV show that has the funny videos.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” Rhodes said. “The county would probably demand a cut since I’m an employee. They might even take all the money and leave us with none.”
“You’d be famous, though.”
“I’m already famous. Milton Munday talks about me all the time. And then there’s Sage Barton.”
Ivy laughed. “Just wait till they make the Sage Barton movie. You’ll be on Entertainment Tonight, and everybody will want your autograph.”
“How do you know people don’t already want my autograph?”
“I just know. Don’t worry, though. Your time will come.”
Rhodes wasn’t worried. He didn’t want to be a celebrity. He was happy with things just the way they were.
“I have to go out again right before dark,” he said.
“That’s only about half an hour. What’s going on now?”
“Another hog hunt.”
Ivy sighed. “I guess it wouldn’t do any good to tell you to be careful.”
“You know me,” Rhodes said.
“I know you, all right,” Ivy said. She reached across the table to touch Rhodes’s hand. “That’s what worries me.”
Chapter 15
The old Carroll place was now owned by someone who lived in Houston, or maybe it was Dallas. Rhodes could never remember where he lived or who he was. People in the cities were driving up the property values in the county by buying land, but they seldom visited after they’d bought it.
Whoever the owner was, he didn’t like the fact that feral hogs were tearing up his property, and he’d given Arvid Fowler and his friends permission to hunt on the land anytime they wanted to. At least that was what Fowler told Rhodes when he was asked.
“Guy’s name is Brown,” Fowler said as he helped Winston with the dogs. Garver hadn’t shown up yet. “I think he’d even pay us a bounty on the hogs if we asked him to, but we hunt ’em for the sport and the meat, not for money.”
They were parked off the county road on a sandy trail leading to the woods that covered a good bit of the property. About fifty yards away on their left was a little cabin that Brown must use when he came to take a look at his land. Rhodes saw that an electric line ran to the cabin, and there was a water well with a pump shed in back.
Garver arrived about that time and joined them. The dogs were leashed and ready to go, and the men were all armed, Fowler and Garver with their pistols, Winston with his rifle.
“You aren’t worried after what happened to Rapinski?” Rhodes asked them.
“That’s got nothing to do with us,” Winston said. “Neither does that other fella. We’re sorry about ’em and all that, but what happened to them was just a coincidence. Nothing to do with us.”
“The Eccles cousins are in jail,” Rhodes said, changing tactics. “Did you know that?”
“Nope,” Fowler sai
d. “They get in trouble a lot, though. What’d they do now?”
“Assaulted an officer,” Rhodes said. “Namely me. Now why do you think they’d do a thing like that?”
None of the men would meet his eyes. Winston looked at the dogs. Fowler looked at the early-rising moon. Garver looked at the ground.
“Something happened in those woods the other night,” Rhodes said. “A man was killed. His name was Baty. He wasn’t from around here, and maybe none of you knew him. Or maybe you did.”
Rhodes looked at Garver, who didn’t look up.
“Maybe none of you knew Rapinski, either,” Rhodes continued, “but he’s dead, too. Both of them dead, both of them out in the woods near you when it happened. Something stampeded those hogs the other night. That’s enough to make a man wonder.”
“Just a coincidence,” Winston said again. The dogs pulled him a step or two toward the woods. “That’s all it is, and you oughtn’t make it to be anything else. Those hogs stampede all the time, so that’s no surprise. Right now, my dogs want to hunt. Are you gonna go with us, or are we gonna stand here talking all night?”
Rhodes gave up. “Let’s go,” he said.
* * *
The walking was easier on Brown’s land. The hogs hadn’t messed it up as much as they had at the Leverett place. The trees grew a little closer together in the woods, too. That would make the hunting a little trickier, Rhodes thought, but he didn’t mention it. He just hoped that hogs were all they had to worry about.
They reached the woods without incident, and Rhodes started to relax a little. Once they were in the trees, Rapper wouldn’t be able to find them, even if he knew they were somewhere on the property. That didn’t rule out vandalism to the cars, however. Rhodes wished he’d thought of that sooner.
Then he heard the motorcycles. Their unmistakable roar sounded closer than Rhodes would have thought they could’ve gotten without betraying their presence. He turned around and saw two single headlights bouncing down the road.
The others didn’t notice or didn’t care. They didn’t know how much trouble they were in. When the motorcycles got closer, Winston looked back and said, “What the hell?”
“Trouble,” Rhodes said. “I warned Arvid. Didn’t he tell you?”
