by Terry Shames
“I’m looking for Slate and Angel.”
“They ain’t here.”
“That’s Slate’s SUV.”
He pauses for a second, looking at the SUV as if puzzled. “They took the Cadillac.” His speech cadence is a little off.
“You mind if I get out and stretch my legs?” I open the door and ease out. I walk around and stretch my arms over my head while he watches as if he thinks I might suddenly dart past him and make a run for the house.
“You know when they plan to be back?”
He scratches his head. “Slate didn’t tell me. He said him and Angel were going to get some barbecue.”
“My name is Samuel Craddock. I’m the chief of police over in Jarrett Creek, and I need to discuss something with them.”
He squints at me and for a minute there’s no sign that he recognizes my name, but then a lightbulb goes on. “I remember you. My daddy liked you.” His smile and voice are childlike, and suddenly I understand the “something that wasn’t quite right” that used to be said about him.
“Yes, I remember your daddy,” I say. “He’s been gone a long time.”
“Yes, he died.”
“Where do Slate and Angel usually go to get barbecue?”
“They went into Blanco, and they’re going to bring me some back.”
“You’re Slate’s brother, aren’t you? Harold is it?”
“Yes, I’m Slate’s foreman.” He says it proudly.
“Harold, you have cell phone service out here?”
“No. A lot of people who used to come out here said they wished we did.”
“Is there a phone in the house?” I nod toward the main building and take a few steps in that direction. “I’d like to call Slate.”
“You can’t go in there.” His voice is suddenly loud.
“Beg pardon?”
“It’s under construction and it’s dangerous.”
“Harold, I don’t see any construction tools or vehicles around here, and if it’s safe enough for Slate and Angel to go inside, it’s safe enough for me to walk in and use the telephone.”
“Slate told me not to let anybody inside.”
“All right, I’ll take your word for it. I’m going over to Blanco and see if I can locate them. What color is the Cadillac?”
“It’s whitish.”
Blanco isn’t a large town and its biggest claim to eating fame is a big barbecue place called the Barbecue Palace. If the McCluskys have gone over to Blanco for lunch, that’s likely where I’ll find them.
I finally find a parking place in the half-acre lot and walk up to join the people lined up under the huge billboard of Carlton King, owner of the Barbecue Palace, wearing a wide grin and a gaudy crown. The line snakes past big brick pits with sheets of tin lying over them to hold in the smoke. At each pit there’s a man stationed who periodically raises the tin and slops barbecue sauce over the grilling meat using long-handled cloth mops. When they lift the lid, the smell wafts out over the crowd and draws murmurs of appreciation. There’s a stir of some kind going on up at the head of the line and I hear someone say, “Angel Bright.”
I step out of line, walk up to the front, and find Angel holding court with several fans, middle-aged men and women thrusting pieces of paper for Angel to sign. “I can’t believe y’all remember me,” Angel says. She’s dressed in a bright rose-colored shirt with her name spelled out in sequins, so it’s no great surprise that they recognized her. Standing off to the side, Slate is favoring the fans with his indulgent smile, the same kind of look you’d have if you owned “best in show” at a county fair.
When I call Slate’s name, he turns and I believe his look of surprise is genuine. His smile widens and he grabs my hand and pumps it. “If this doesn’t beat everything! What are you doing here?”
Angel glances at me, and her look doesn’t convey the welcome that Slate’s does. But she recovers quickly. “Hey, nice to see you.”
“You with anybody?” Slate says. “Why don’t you join us?”
“I actually came out here looking for you,” I say.
“For me? How’d you know I was here?”
Before I can speak, understanding dawns in his eyes and his smile falters.
“Your brother told me,” I say.
“So you’ve seen what a mess he’s made of my resort.” He shakes his head, still smiling. “That’s what you get when you leave things in somebody’s hands and don’t check up on them often enough. He may be my brother, but I can’t say he’s done a real good job.”
“Isn’t it terrible?” Angel chimes in. “Poor Slate almost had a heart attack when he got out there a few months ago and saw how Harold had run it into the ground.”
Whatever made that resort lose ground didn’t happen overnight. The ruin I saw took many months, or even years, of neglect. I’m wondering why poor Harold is taking the heat.
We step inside the cafe and the pungent smell of barbecue makes me put everything else aside for a while. Carlton King himself is behind the counter, looking like he’s been sampling his own food a little more than is healthy. His big, booming voice touts the baby back ribs, brisket, chicken, and sausage.
“Well, if it isn’t Miss Angel Bright,” he booms. “Your order is on the house. These two jokers with you will have to pay for their own food, though.” He laughs and Angel gives him her biggest smile. Slate grins and says, “I might know it! My little wife gets a freebie and I have to pay. But I’m going to pay for my friend Craddock, here, too.”
Angel orders the chicken, and Slate and I go for the brisket and rib combo. All the plates come with big globs of potato salad. At the end of the line there’s a vat of beans and tubs of jalapenos, raw onions, pickles, and three different kinds of barbecue sauce labeled “sweet,” “spicy,” and “too damn hot to be good for you.”
We grab seats at one of the picnic tables set up behind the building. The early morning nip is gone, and the sun is warm and friendly. We have to put up with a couple more people who come over and tell Angel how much they love her music. One man, dressed all in black from boots to hat, hands Angel a card. “I do a little music producing. Why don’t you call me if you’re interested in a comeback tour.”
Slate gets up abruptly. His smile is strained. “Thank you, but Angel isn’t interested.”
The man tips his finger to his hat. “No offense intended. Sorry, ma’am.”
“Not a problem,” Slate says. He sits back down, seeming oblivious to the effect the exchange has had on Angel. Her face has gone ashen and she’s staring at her plate as if she mistakenly picked up a plate of rattlesnakes. When the man is out of earshot she says, “There was no need for you to be rude.”
“Honey, I wasn’t the one being rude. If somebody wants to make you an offer, they need to go through channels.”
“What channels?” she says, eyes still on her plate.
“Let’s don’t get into it in front of Samuel. That’s for us to work out privately.” He turns to me with a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. “Tell me how the investigation is going. Have you figured out who killed that banker yet?”
That banker. As if he didn’t know Gary Dellmore’s name. We were all at the same meeting and you’d think McClusky had never met him. “Matter of fact, the reason I’m here is that I’m talking with everybody who was at the meeting the night Dellmore was killed. I went by your place this morning and someone told me they thought you’d come out here to your resort. I figured coming out this way to find you would be a clever way to get myself some decent barbecue, too.”
“I don’t understand why you didn’t just call. Surely you could find my cell number.”
“I did try. There wasn’t any answer.”
He snaps his fingers. “That’s right. We sometimes have problems with cell coverage out at the resort.”
I pick up one of the barbecue ribs and start gnawing on it. Angel is dabbling in her potato salad, leaving the chicken untouched.
Suddenly, t
he music changes and “I Just Called to Say Remember When,” Angel’s last big hit, comes blaring out of the big speakers on the roof.
“Listen, Slate, they’re playing my music.”
“I believe Carlton King has a crush on you,” Slate says. He’s back to being the indulgent uncle, and Angel is trying to retrieve her cheerful smile. Several people turn to look at her. She nods in time to the music, doing finger waves at people. When the song is over she says quietly, “I’m sick to death of that song.”
Slate reaches over swiftly and grabs Angel’s wrist. “Just remember the sound of money every time you hear it.” He lets go and turns back to me. “Now what is it you came all the way out here to ask me?”
“I wanted to know if you saw or heard anything unusual as you were leaving the meeting the other night.”
He gnaws a rib and when he puts it down says, “Like I said at the meeting, I don’t remember anything but wanting to get home. I’m sorry you came all the way out here for that.”
“It’s all right. It’s a nice drive.” I eat a bite of brisket and then say, “Did you ever have any business dealings with Gary Dellmore?”
The plastic fork Angel has been poking into her potato salad stops moving. I can feel the tension radiating off her.
“I have had some dealings with him,” Slate says, “but it didn’t amount to much. Couple of small loans. I thought since I lived part-time in Jarrett Creek, I ought to throw some business to the bank there.” He shakes his head, his smile rueful. “Can’t say I was fond of him. He was something of a know-it-all.”
“You own any guns?”
“Of course I do. Hunting rifles, a shotgun, that sort of thing.”
“You own a .45-caliber handgun?”
McClusky considers. “No, I don’t own any handguns. I’m a rifleman.” He grins. “But Angel does, don’t you, sugar? She kept one for her protection when she was a celebrity, and with me gone so much, I insist that she keep one in the bedside drawer. Can’t have anybody coming in and hurting my girl, here. Why are you asking? You think I had some reason to be mad at Dellmore? He was pretty feisty at that meeting the other night.” He laughs.
Angel gets up abruptly. “If you all will excuse me, I’ll be right back. I need to powder my nose.”
McClusky watches her leave, as do half a dozen other people sitting at tables around us. “Quite a woman,” he says and winks at me.
“She had a good career,” I say. “She didn’t mind giving it up when she married you?”
McClusky shrugs. “I offered her a good bit more stability than the music business. But the real reason she gave it up is because her sweet little voice was slipping. Don’t tell her I said so.”
Despite McClusky’s dewy-eyed smile, his words are biting and I feel like I’ve had a glimpse behind a curtain that should have stayed closed. I think about that poster I saw announcing a comeback—a comeback I don’t remember actually happening. Maybe they had to cancel it because her voice wasn’t up to it.
Slate wads up his napkin and throws it onto his plate. “Getting back to the subject, sounds like Dellmore was killed with a .45.”
“That’s right.”
Angel slips back onto the bench across from us. “What are y’all talking about?”
“Maybe you better confiscate my wife’s gun and have it tested.” He laughs and nods in her direction. “Angel packs a Colt .45. She might have had a grudge against the banker that she’s keeping secret from everybody.”
Angel gets up from the table again, picks up her barely touched plate and dumps it into a nearby trashcan.
“A .45 is a big gun for a small woman,” I say.
“She can handle it if she uses both hands.” Angel has come back, and Slate says, “The idea is to have a gun that will stop somebody in his tracks. Didn’t I tell you that, honey?”
Angel stares at him but doesn’t reply. I get the feeling she’s one step short of lashing out at him, though he doesn’t seem to notice.
“Yes, I always say you can’t ever be too careful,” McClusky says.
“Slate, I’d like to go now,” Angel says.
“Honey, I don’t know if Samuel is done questioning us.”
I get up off the bench and pick up my empty plate. “I’ve got a lot to do. Do you have a number where I can reach you out at the resort since the cell service isn’t good out there?”
“Oh, we’re not staying there. We always stay at a private condo at the Marriott out in Horseshoe Bay,” Slate says. “You can reach us out there on our cell phones.”
I’m happy to hit the road and get away from those two. There’s something between them that feels off. Maybe they’re just having a fight, but it feels like it goes deeper than that. Like for some reason they have begun to dislike each other and it poisons the air around them.
As I pass the turnoff to McClusky’s resort on my way home, I have an urge to stop back by and insist that Harold let me go inside. Whatever is bothering the McCluskys extends to their resort as well: something is not right. Where are all the animals? Why did the resort go to seed the way it did? And what’s inside the main building that Harold didn’t want me to see?
I’m half an hour from home when I hear a strange sound, as if the radio is tuned to a station that’s playing some kind of electronic guitar music. Since the radio hasn’t worked in some time, I’m especially puzzled. But the sound repeats itself, and I realize it’s not coming from the radio but from my pocket. The cell phone. I didn’t even notice what kind of sound the phone would make when I was setting it up.
I don’t trust myself to drive and talk on the phone at the same time, so I pull over and take the thing out of my pocket and look at it. It’s police headquarters calling.
I punch the button to take the call and hold the phone up to my ear, not quite trusting even yet that this contraption will give me the same ability to hear and speak that my home phone does. “This is Samuel Craddock.”
“Chief Craddock, thank God, I’ve been trying to reach you. Where are you?” Bill Odum sounds frantic.
“I’ll be back in town soon. What’s going on?”
“I got back here an hour ago, and a call came in about a fender bender out at the dam road. Nobody was hurt, but somebody was driving by and said the two guys involved were getting heated up, and he thought we ought to go out there and get it sorted out. So I drove over, and you’re never going to believe what happened.”
“Don’t keep me hanging here, Odum. Tell me.”
“Well, sir, one of them was driving Gary Dellmore’s car.” There’s a crackling on the line and I’m not sure I’ve heard him right.
“Did you say ‘driving Dellmore’s car’?”
“Yes, sir. A drifter who’s been staying out at the lake. He’s got some wild tale explaining how he came to be driving it.”
“You didn’t let him leave with the car, did you?”
“Heck no! I’ve got him in a holding cell here at the station, and Zeke is out at the dam keeping an eye on the car.”
“All right. I’ll be there soon.”
He sighs. “There is one more thing. You might want to talk to Chief Skinner’s wife when you get a chance.”
“I went by to see her yesterday. What did she want?”
“She said she needed to talk to you.”
“I’ll take care of it when I can. It’ll take me a half hour to get back to Jarrett Creek. Hold the fort until I get there.”
I push my truck pretty hard getting back, and Odum is grinning when I walk in.
“You’re sure the car is Dellmore’s?” I say first thing.
“Yes, sir, no question. I asked both drivers involved in the accident for their license and registration. The guy driving the Crown Vic tried to make some excuse, but I insisted. Turned out he doesn’t have a valid driver’s license, and the car was registered to Dellmore. He claimed Dellmore lent it to him. But the story is obviously b.s., so I brought him in. He’s in one of the cells.”
“And you called Zeke to watch the car?”
“Yes, sir, as soon as I realized what we had, he came out to keep an eye on it.”
“Did you mention Gary Dellmore to the driver?”
“No, sir. I just told him he was driving a stolen car. I figured you’d want to start from the beginning.”
“You did a good job.” I shake his hand.
“I’m really glad I came back in. But I told my dad I’d go back to help him finish up as soon as I could.”
“Get on with it, then.”
He tells me where the car is located, and I ask if he’ll take the dam road on the way out of town and tell Zeke I’ll be there as soon as I can.
“Uh, Chief, I could call him on his cell phone.”
I start laughing. “You sure he’s got one?”
“Yeah, that’s how I reached him to begin with.” He grins at me. We’re both a little giddy. Finding Dellmore’s car is a break we needed.
As soon as Odum is out the door, I brew myself a pot of coffee and head into the back where we have the two jail cells, with an extra cup for the prisoner.
“I could sure use that,” he says as he snatches it out of my hand. He’s a weasel of a guy, in his twenties with ropy arms and longish dishwater-blond hair that doesn’t look like it’s been washed recently. Neither have his jeans or his jacket, which give off the smell of fish. Most likely he’s one of those people who stays out at the lake living on whatever money they can scrounge and supplementing their food with whatever they can catch.
His name is Louis Caton, and he says he’s from the Gulf Coast and is just drifting around. “I want to get some living in before I settle down.” When I hand him the coffee, he sits down on his cot and leans back against the concrete wall. “Man, I needed this coffee.”
I drag a chair in from the office and sit down to question him. “How long have you been staying out at the lake, Louis?”
“Couple months.”
“How did you meet Gary Dellmore?”
“Who?”
“The guy whose car you said you borrowed.”
“Oh, him. I didn’t know his name. I met him and we got to talking and I told him it was hard getting around without a car, and he said he’d be glad to lend me his.”
