“That sixty percent match bothers me. Age of the gun and all … I don’t know. I’m not completely convinced.”
“Don’t always get a hundred,” Starnes said. “The percentage is high enough for most juries.”
“Maybe. But it does leave some wiggle room.”
“If you’re a defense lawyer,” she said.
“And if you happen to be seeking the truth. I want to talk with Cain again,” I said.
“His lawyer will have to be there.”
“He has a lawyer already?”
“I think Adam and Evelyn hired someone the day we arrested him,” Starnes said.
“Local?”
“Asheville, I think.”
“You know him?”
“Her,” Starnes said.
“Her. You know her?”
“One of my deputies said her reputation was okay, no Perry Mason, but okay.”
“Perry Mason have a female counterpart?”
“Besides Della?” Starnes asked.
“She was the secretary,” I said.
“The reruns I watched give the idea that she was more than just some secretary.”
“But not a lawyer,” I said. “You’re the scientist here. Wouldn’t you prefer to have a higher percentage of certainty that the bullet matched the gun belonging to Cain Gosnell?”
“If that was all we had, I’d agree. But we have fingerprints from that campfire and we have a solid motive.”
“Can’t shake my doubts on this one,” I said.
“Intuition or you like the guy?”
“I don’t much like the guy. He’s hardly a warm fuzzy. Still, my opinion of him does not make him a murderer.”
“Nor absolve him of a crime of passion.”
Starnes had one of the clerks call the lawyer’s office in Asheville to inform them that we wanted to talk to Cain Gosnell. Despite the lawyer’s reluctance, she set up the appointment for Saturday morning.
The lawyer was Barbara Richardson, a woman in her forties, petite, semi-attractive, dark brown hair with some slight gray streaks, and feisty. Her brown, faux-leather briefcase was noticeably present on top of the table in the interview room instead of the floor by her chair. I wondered at the position of it, but decided it wasn’t worth much consideration. Maybe she was trying to impress me. It wasn’t working.
There was a small pile of papers in front of her. Starnes was with me, but said for me to do the talking before we entered the interview room.
“Who are you?” Lawyer Richardson asked when I pulled out the uncomfortable metal chair and sat down. Starnes stood in the corner by the door. If someone walked into the room, Starnes would have been behind the door at that point. With her disgruntled demeanor and position, one might consider her to be a guard for the establishment.
“Friend of the sheriff,” I said.
“Lawyer?” she asked.
“No.”
“Police officer?”
“No.”
“Law enforcement of any agency?”
“No.”
“What the hell are you doing here talking to my client?”
“Concerned citizen for justice,” I said.
“But if you think my client is guilty, just what justice are you seeking?”
“Not completely sure about the guilt of your client, hence my presence.”
“What’s your question?”
“We know you slaughtered those sheep,” I said to Cain.
“Don’t say anything,” Richardson said to him.
“The difference between the sentencing for damaging someone’s property and murder is significant,” I said.
“I know that,” Cain said.
“We have a positive match between your Luger and the 9mm slugs that came from the sheep. We know you did that.”
“Don’t answer that,” she said to him.
“I didn’t ask anything. I informed him.”
“Don’t say anything,” Lawyer Richardson said to Cain.
She frowned at me. “Someone could have stolen his gun and shot those sheep. You cannot prove that he was there.”
“He had the gun in his possession when we arrested him.”
“He could have handed the gun to someone and they shot the sheep, then they handed the gun back to him.”
“A good story. A better one might be that he could have stood by while his fairy godmother picked off the sheep one by one,” Starnes said from the corner.
“Cain, listen to me,” I said, “it’s one thing to go down for slaughtering animals. It’s quite another to go down for killing your brother.”
“Don’t respond to that,” Richardson said. “They’re trying to trap you. If you have nothing else of substance to say to my client, then this interview is over.”
“One more thing,” I said. “Cain, did you kill your brother Abelard?”
“No,” he said as he shook his head.
“Do you know who did?” I asked.
“Don’t answer that,” Richardson said to him. “This interview is over.”
“At least think about it. I’m trying to help you. If you’re not willing to trust me, then talk to your lawyer here. Call me if you have anything to say.”
“Don’t sit by the phone,” Richardson said to me. “It’ll be a waste of your time.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Cain Gosnell’s murder trial was scheduled to begin on December 15, but the judge decided to move the trial to the first week of January due to water damage in the courtroom caused by the unattended overflowing toilet located directly above the judge’s bench. The word we received was that it smelled awful and that there was no way Judge Leroy T. Briggs was going to sit in that courtroom and listen to any case until that crap was cleaned up and the smell removed forthwith and the leaking ceiling repaired. The maintenance crew said it would take a couple of weeks, and since that would run into Christmas, it was an easy decision on Judge Briggs’ part to push the date into January.
For the time being, Thanksgiving was sitting on top of us. Starnes and I were planning a big day. We were going to the Eventide Nursing Home and Assisted Living for a holiday feast. That was the official language used in the flier handed out to everyone who had entered the facility over the last two weeks. Family members were invited, of course. When I reminded Starnes that there was no shared blood flowing in our veins, she told me that she always wanted a sister and that I would do in a pinch. Vote of confidence.
She also told me that there was no way in hell she was going to that nursing home dinner without me, and that she was definitely going. She lied to the officials about our relations, so I was definitely going.
The meal was served in the large dining hall where the residents usually ate. Instead of round tables with six chairs, they brought in rectangular tables and placed them end to end, thus forming four long rows and seating the 96 residents and their family members side by side in this wondrous design. It called to mind those covered-dish church functions of my youth. I think the idea was that at least one or two from each family would have the added attraction of dining alongside of someone new in order to engage in conversation. Starnes sat at the very end of the table facing her father on one side row and me on the other side row. She could talk with either Spud or me. I, on the other hand, had the good fortune of sitting next to one of the residents, a smallish lady with osteoporosis so dominating her that the measured distance from her mouth to her plate appeared to be in centimeters. In order to talk with her, I had to bend down nearly touching my plate and catch her peripheral vision by turning my head sideways and looking at her. This meant that my food was literally an inch or so from my ear whenever she wanted to talk with me. It proved to be less than a stimulating conversation, although it was unique.
It wasn’t my idea to talk so much with my companion. It was hers. She had story after story to tell, so I simply was trying to be kind to her and listen. Besides that, she had no family to show up for the affair. Touched my heart.
The conversation with her in that position nearly ruined my appetite, however. You can only get so close to your food before your appetite runs screaming from the table.
Just before they served us our dessert, Spud Carver looked across the table directly at me and spoke to me for the first time that day.
“I know you, don’t I?” he said.
While I was delighted that his memory was showing some sign of catching onto the idea that I was still around, living with his daughter in his house, and coming to the facility to see him at least twice a week for the last several weeks, his timing was horrible in terms of the people sitting around the table. All the people close by us had naturally assumed that I was the other daughter. I think Starnes had enjoyed perpetrating the lie.
Life is full of great surprises and wondrous moments. Sometimes they show up at odd intervals without explanation. Instead of being able to affirm him in his head knowledge, I had to fake crying, excuse myself from the table, and go to the ladies’ room while Starnes tried to explain my distraught emotions of having my father fail recognize me.
Starnes was nearly as good a con artist as I was, so she had no trouble knowing what to do at the moment. By the time I had returned, everyone sitting close by us was smiling and nodding in my direction. Some even got up from their desserts to come by and put a hand on my shoulder or pat me a couple of times to offer some comfort in my raw grief. Tea and sympathy.
I shook my head is disbelief in Starnes’ direction when no one appeared to be looking at me. She smiled – a wicked, wry smile.
Lady Osteoporosis offered to say a silent prayer for me and I thanked her for the kindness. I make it a policy never to refuse anyone who offers to pray for me, no matter which religion represented by the one offering said prayer. Hedge around my life, so to speak.
On the ride back to the house, Starnes wanted to talk.
“That was hard, Clancy.”
“You mean your father failing to recognize his other daughter?”
“No. The meal itself. Having a Thanksgiving dinner without my mom. First time ever. I always make it a planned date to come home for turkey day. This was the first one without her.”
“Yeah, that had to be hard.”
“Doubly so.”
“With your father in the facility?”
“Not so much that, but, well, there’s stuff you don’t know about my folks. Twenty years ago, when I was a teenager, my father had an affair with a woman in the church. He left us for nearly six months, had his fling, and then showed up late one night a few months later. The other woman had kicked him out and he was crawling back home.”
“Tough on a teenager,” I said.
“Tough on my mother. I wanted to castrate him. But Mom, being the saint she was, took him back and forgave him. I don’t think I ever forgave him.”
“He was faithful after that…to your mother?”
“Oh yeah, he was faithful to her, after his half year thingamajig. I just don’t know how she could forgive such a thing as that.”
“She loved him.”
“That’s not enough.”
“If love’s the real thing, then it’s more than enough,” I said.
“How do you know?”
“I’ve seen it a time or two. Heard of it, you know, when I was in church growing up. I believe my father and mother had it. I think there is such a thing as real, honest-to-goodness love that is self-giving and has the ability to forgive all of those slings and arrows of outrageousness that life seems to have in abundance. Evidently, your mother had that kind of love for your father.”
“But he didn’t have it for her,” Starnes said.
“Maybe he found it after she took him back and forgave him.”
“Maybe, but he was always a bastard or a prick, even after I left home. Mom would say, he’ll be okay, just give him time.”
“There’s an old saying that says love endures all.”
“You believe that?”
“If you have that love, then, well, yes. I kind of hope that it’s out there. Gives me a chance to find it with the right man.”
“You think there’s a right man out there for you?” Starnes asked.
“As in only one?”
“You want more than one?”
“No. One would be sufficient. But I meant, is there only one for me out there somewhere, in your opinion?” I said.
“Don’t know that much about life. What do you think?” she said.
“I think that it is possible to find the right man, but there is not just one out there. Lots of possibilities, and those possibilities could be the right ones if I am fortunate to find at least one of them, and they find me.”
“Sounds a bit convoluted. Hey, you let me know when that happens,” Starnes said.
“I shall indeed.”
We rode on in silence for several minutes. I could smell the food scraps we had begged from the kitchen staff of Eventide as we were leaving. We knew that Sam would be more than a little appreciative.
“You still working on trying to forgive you father?” I said, breaking the silence.
“Not since his mind has lapsed of late. What good would it do? I doubt if he even remembers bringing so much hurt to our home.”
“Forgiveness may have more benefits for you than for Spud,” I said. “Grudges are hard things to hang on to. They can stunt your growth and make you ill. Been there and done that. I speak from some experience.”
“You let go of yours?” she asked.
“Yeah. I did. Took a while, but I finally made peace.”
“Your father’s murder,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“I heard that those involved were killed. You find much peace in that?”
“Not what I really wanted, but, there was a kinda peace.”
“I’ll reflect on that,” she said.
We were silent the rest of the way home. Once when an oncoming car failed to dim its high beams, I looked over in her direction and thought I saw her wipe a tear from her eye.
Chapter Twenty-Three
McAdams County was quiet during the time leading up to Christmas. I had planned to return to Norfolk until the trial began, but Starnes insisted that I stay on and help her with the continuing adjustments of being sheriff. She had weekly meetings with what she called the real sheriff. She would return from those sessions and tell me what a piece of work old Buster was. She never said that whenever the deputies were around. I heard her say more than once that she would never in this lifetime work for a man like Buster Murdock. At any rate, I was maintained on her freebee payroll to help with those weekly adjustments. So, as a compromise, Sam and I drove back to Norfolk, stayed several days in early December, visited my mother in Clancyville, and then returned to the Carver house around mid-month, a week or so before Christmas Day.
While I was home in Norfolk, I had Rogers do some checking on 9mm German Lugers. Rosey called while I was home to say that he was spending Christmas in Norway due to an additional job offered to him at the last minute. He said that the money was too good to turn down on this one, so he would stay on and see me in late January. No one was shooting at him and the gig was easy enough to do without fretting for his life. I figured it was a government job which he had no choice but to take despite his attempt to make it sound appealing.
Rosey’s call made me think of my mother for some reason, so I called her to see how she was fairing. After suffering a few digs for not checking in with her around Thanksgiving, I told her that I would be celebrating Christmas in McAdams County with my friend Starnes Carver. Rachel Jo was none too elated with me for sharing that news. However, after I explained that her mother had died recently and that she had placed her father in an assisted living facility shortly after the funeral, and that I was coming by for a pre-Christmas visit on my way back to McAdams County, she relented a little of her daughter-badgering until some future time when I would cross whatever line she drew in the sand in our relationship. I did tell h
er that I loved her and missed her. That was true.
Rogers gave me what she found on 9mm German Lugers in a thirty-six page report she printed out. I packed the report along with some clean clothes and headed to Clancyville for a few days. My short sojourn in my hometown was rather pleasant. Rachel was in a festive spirit. This limited her verbal darts usually aimed at my heart. We actually had some tolerable conversations along with the always good food she prepared.
A couple of days after I had returned to McAdams County, Starnes suggested that we drive over to Johnson City to do some shopping at the mall.
“I don’t shop,” I said.
“You already bought me a present for Christmas?” she asked.
“Didn’t know we were on the gift-giving level of our relationship.”
“Yeah. Surprises me, too.”
“So, we’re exchanging gifts?”
“Might as well,” she said.
“Why should we begin now?” I said.
“Because we’re gonna be here together for Christmas,” she explained.
“Yuletide by proximity,” I said.
“Not sure what that means, but yeah, we’re in this together, so we might as well be nice to each other.”
“You bought me a present?” I said.
“No. That’s why we need to go over to the mall in Tennessee,” she reasoned.
We walked and looked and walked some more. It was a big mall in Johnson City and one can only imagine how many others believed that it was a good place to shop during the time leading up to Christmas Day. I would have thought that everyone who lived in east Tennessee and western North Carolina had gathered on that Friday evening in that mall. Multitudes surrounded my multitudes. It was certainly not my desired place to be.
Two hours into the fray, I begged Starnes for a break in the action. A small coffee shop that served sweet rolls and other sinful delights was just the right ticket for me. As usual, I found us a corner table where we could watch the mad shoppers coming and going along the pathway in front of our resting spot. Our location at the back of the shop provided sufficient dim lighting which offered us some cover from the maddening crowd. It felt secluded despite the two million people or so walking in front of us.
When Blood Cries: A Clancy Evans Mystery (Clancy Evans PI Book 6) Page 11
