by Terry Shames
A bitter twist contorts the man’s mouth. “Once a month, when he comes to collect the lease money.”
That startles me. “He drives here once a month? Seems kind of unnecessary when you could just send it in.”
The man walks a few steps toward me. His eyebrows bristle and his eyes are fierce. “The son of a bitch wants the property back. Thinks he can get more money from the government letting it lie fallow. It’s in the lease that if we don’t keep it up, he can cancel the contract.”
“You have any children?”
“Boy and a girl. In school over in Bobtail.” A spark of pride flares in his eyes and then dies.
His wife comes back out and hands me a piece of paper. It occurs to me that she’s angry with him because he refuses to back down and abandon the place. They are wearing themselves out on this farm.
“I’ll let you get back to it,” I say. “Sorry to have bothered you.”
The dog trots to my car with me. I lean over and give it a friendly pat. He might not get too many of those.
Back in the office, I put in a call to the Bobtail sheriff’s office. Roland Newberry is out, but the officer manning the front desk seems willing to help.
“I’d like to check up on a couple of men.”
“What do you mean check up on them?”
“I mean, do they have a criminal record or been in any trouble.”
“Where are they from?”
“Houston. One of them is named Barton Dudley.” I read his business address off the card he gave me. “The other one is a black man. Freddie Carmichael.”
“That his real name, or is it Frederick?”
“I don’t know. He said he was from Chicago but lives in Houston now.”
“I’ll run it through the criminal records in the state public safety archives and see if I can get you anything.”
I hang up as Bonnie Bedichek whirls in and plants herself in front of my desk. “It’s time for you and me to have a talk,” she says.
“I thought we already did,” I say. “Why don’t you sit down?”
She sits, but I have the impression that she could bounce off the chair any minute. She’s a bundle of energy, even though she’s got to be at least forty. “I want to know everything you know about that fire,” she says.
“Whoa,” I say. “I may not have a lot of experience dealing with homicide, but I don’t think it works that way between the law and the press.”
She cocks her head to one side. “How do you think it works?”
“For one thing, you and the law are after two different things. We want to catch who killed those children and you want to tell people about it.”
“I don’t see that as being all that different.”
“Let me ask you this. Suppose I knew an important clue to solving a case and I let that information slip to you. Are you telling me that you’d keep quiet?”
She opens her mouth like she’s going to say something and then shuts it again and narrows her eyes at me. “A free press is important.”
“So is getting criminals off the street. You didn’t answer my question.”
“Are you telling me that you have a suspect?”
“No, hell no. If you print something like that, you’ll make a fool out of both of us. Like I told you, I’m not even part of the investigation.”
“You really think that highway patrolman gives a damn who killed those people? As far as Sutherland is concerned, this is a little bump in the road and whatever happens here is of no consequence. It will be forgotten in a few days.”
“I’ll keep after them,” I say.
“You think that’s going to matter to him?”
“Why does it matter to you? You don’t even know if those people are from around here. Someone said they were squatters.”
“Who said that?”
I feel my face getting hot. I don’t know how to handle a woman like her. She doesn’t back down an inch. “Just somebody,” I say.
She narrows her eyes. “Whoever it was, it happened in your town and you’re never going to be much of a lawman if you don’t take what happens here seriously.”
Now I’ve had it. “I don’t need you telling me how to do my job.” I get up. “Now I’ve got work to do.”
She stays seated and grins up at me. “You do have a little fire in you. I’m glad to see it.” She jumps up. “I want an exclusive when you figure out what happened out there.”
I can’t help laughing. She sounds like somebody on TV. “I don’t even know what that means. You’re the only newspaper in town. Who else would I tell?”
“You’re kidding, right? Yesterday that Albert Lamond was here. Before long, all the big newspapers are going to be nosing around.”
“Reporters from the Houston Chronicle and the Dallas Morning News were already out at the crime scene.”
“Goddammit,” she says. “That’s the problem with being the one and only reporter. I had to interview the football coach yesterday afternoon. If this town didn’t get their football news, I’d be run out of town.”
“I don’t think they got much out of their visit,” I say. “Nobody knows anything yet.”
Chapter 12
In the few months’ training I had, it was mandatory to view an autopsy. I got through it, but I can’t say it was an experience I want to repeat. I have an uneasy feeling that viewing an autopsy on burn victims is going to be a whole different thing.
Although I slept all right in my motel room in Austin, I’m up at six a.m. and wish I had something to do to calm my nerves. The desk clerk tells me there’s a good walking trail down by the lake. I spend an hour with the walkers, runners, bicyclists, and dogs. I’m usually a good breakfast eater, but I keep it light this morning, eating some toast and bacon in the gloomy motel café. Something tells me I better not push my luck with food.
I asked Jeanne to come with me, but she said it was a good chance to go and visit her mother in Fort Worth, so we have gone our separate ways. I would have been poor company last night anyway.
The medical examiner’s office is in Breckinridge Hospital. Clinton Heywood told me to find him and he’d take me to the autopsy room. His office is on the third floor.
Heywood looks like he escaped from the cadaver room himself, a hunched, bony man of about fifty with a prominent jaw and brow and oversized hands. He shakes my hand and offers me a seat and a cup of coffee. The coffee I drank this morning is sitting sour in my gut, so I decline. He peers at me from under shaggy eyebrows. “You ever see an autopsy on a burn victim?”
“No, sir, I haven’t.”
He sighs. “I can tell you right now it isn’t going to be a pleasant experience. You sure you want to go through with it?”
My heart is belting out a good rhythm, but I’m determined to see this through, otherwise I’ll never be able to look Sutherland in the eye. “I’m ready.”
“Let me just say this: If you think you’re going to lose your breakfast, try to make it outside the autopsy room. And don’t be embarrassed.”
I’m not a timid man. With a set of folks like mine, I learned to roll with all kinds of mayhem, from shouting matches to cleaning up after my daddy’s binges. I remind myself of this as I head down to the basement with Heywood.
We go through a metal door into an entirely different setting. The smell hits me as soon as Heywood opens the door. It’s a combination of strong lemon scent, mold, and something darker, more primitive, that the disinfectant can’t overpower.
“We only have one autopsy room,” Heywood says, “and it’s crowded down here.”
We pause at another metal door, and Heywood glances back at me. I must look like I’m reasonably in charge of myself, because he nods and opens the door. We enter a small room furnished with a rolling chair, a couple of small sinks, and a lot of cabinets with the contents identified with labels. I take note of gowns, gloves, caps, and then all manner of equipment from saws to scalpels.
Heywood jerks open the gown dra
wer, takes out two stiff green gowns, and hands them to me. “An extra one just in case,” he says.
I don’t even want to consider what “just in case” means. He starts putting on his gear, and I copy what he does, shaking out the gown, pulling it on with the opening in the back, and tying it at the waist and neck. He directs me to wash my hands, and then we finish up with a cap, a mask, and rubber gloves.
Once we’re suited up, he pushes open the swinging doors, introducing us to even stronger smells and to chilling cold. At this point I have two choices: either be overcome by the drama, or get a grip on my emotions and be cool while I observe the proceedings.
My eyes are first drawn to the metal table in the center of the room and the unnaturally lumpy mound covered with a sheet. A fully-gowned man is already waiting at the autopsy table. A black man. When he introduces himself, his voice matches the chill of the air. “I’m Dr. Allingham, one of the medical examiners employed by the state of Texas. May I remind you that the bodies are to be treated with respect. I realize that you may feel uncomfortable at some points in the procedure, but I do not tolerate disrespect in any form, including crude humor. If you are unable to continue observation, please leave the room and do not attempt to return.” With that, he pulls his mask up high on his face and nods to Heywood, who reaches over and pulls back the sheet. Then Heywood steps to a side table and picks up a chart and pen, poised to take notes.
I am thankful that someone has already performed the awful chore of pulling apart the twisted mangle of bodies that I glimpsed in the hallway of the burned house. I can tell that this victim is a young female, and that the reason she loomed so large under the sheet is that the arms and legs are charred into place. From my limited knowledge of what happens to bodies after death, rigor should have relaxed by now and the bodies should be limp. I assume that the fire welded the bones into this grotesque position.
Even worse is the blackened, charred flesh. It’s impossible to tell how much of it is the natural color of the girl’s skin and how much is due to the fire. I try to imagine that I’m reading Allingham’s descriptions, not observing them. In language I can barely comprehend, the examiner confirms my understanding that the fire is responsible for the rigid limbs. He then proceeds to manually force the limbs flat with Heywood’s help, a process that makes a horrible sound like the crack of tree limbs. The only indication that either man is aware of the sound is beads of sweat that pop out on Heywood’s temples above his mask. I can’t help an involuntary shudder, but it’s as much from the cold as from what I’m witnessing.
After that, I watch the rest of the procedure with such detachment that I’m barely aware of time passing as Allingham’s voice drones on, describing his findings. A tape-recorder hums quietly on the counter nearby. I note that the girl’s approximate age is seventeen and that she was sexually active. Allingham also says that the state of the organs makes it impossible to determine the health of the girl prior to her death. He discovers a bullet hole in the left chest and comments that the bullet probably killed the victim before the fire got to her. I think of it as a small mercy.
When he completes the autopsy, I’m surprised to see that three hours have passed. My body is rigid with tension. Both Heywood and Allingham step back, and they’re in a similar state. “Let’s take a lunch break,” Allingham says, nodding to me and then moving to a trash can where he strips off his gloves. “We’ll resume at twelve thirty. We’ll be running late today because I want to finish up.” He strides out of the room.
Heywood pulls the sheet back over the girl, and I have to fight off an impulse to tear up. To steady myself I concentrate on Heywood’s movements as he walks over to the counter and pushes a button. In the distance I hear a bell ringing. Within moments, a shaggy-looking man comes into the room. He and Heywood move the shell of the body onto a gurney and push it into another room. As the door opens, I see a bank of square drawers that must be where bodies are kept before and after autopsy.
Desperate for fresh air, I don’t wait for Heywood but push open the swinging doors, yank off my gown and lay it on the counter, and head for the front of the building. I glance at my watch, determined not to keep anyone waiting. At a coffee shop a couple of blocks away, I force myself to eat a plain chicken sandwich and to down a good strong cup of black coffee.
The break is over too soon, but when I return, I find that the next autopsy doesn’t give me as much trouble. I hate to think that I’m already hardened to the fact that a young girl has been murdered, but I’m grateful for whatever steadies me. This autopsy doesn’t take as long, as if now Allingham is in the groove. He finds that this young girl, a chubby child, approximate age sixteen, was also shot, and that she was sexually active. We take another break mid-afternoon, and then another doctor, Dr. Ferris, shows up to take over for the third autopsy. My feet ache from standing on the concrete floor, and my eyes are watering from the intense fumes of the formaldehyde used to preserve the bodies.
This body is that of a boy about eleven. While Dr. Ferris continues his precise business, I consider why a young boy would have been in the household of young women who may have been prostitutes. The possible explanation makes me sick until Ferris comments that there is no evidence of sexual abuse on the boy’s body. Another feature: his body isn’t as badly burned as the others, as if one of the victims threw herself across him to protect him.
When the ordeal is over, Heywood follows me out and shakes my hand. “This was a long day. You handled it well. I can guarantee you’re rarely going to have to witness an autopsy this hard to take.”
I thank him for his help and he says, “I don’t know if I ought to tell you this. I know the highway patrol has decided to take on this investigation, but . . .” He pauses and runs a hand through his hair. “Sometimes they get busy and things fall by the wayside.” I realize he’s trying to tell me that Sutherland isn’t going to put much manpower into investigating this. Why it matters to Heywood isn’t clear.
“I understand.” I wait, sure he’ll go on.
“During yesterday’s prep of the bodies, we found a name and phone number in one of the girl’s pockets.”
“Where is it now?”
“All the effects were given to the highway patrol.”
“You remember which victim it was?”
“The one that wasn’t burned so badly. Another teenaged girl.”
“Who was the other victim autopsied yesterday?”
“A woman a little older than the others, early thirties. Allingham said she had borne a child when she was young. We speculated she might be the mother of the boy we worked on today.”
After parting ways with Haywood, I waste no time getting to my motel room, where I immediately strip down and shower. After I’m in clean clothes, I consider trashing the clothes I was wearing during the autopsies, but I put them in the laundry bag provided in the room and take the bag outside and throw it into the bed of my pickup.
Surprisingly, I’m famished and eat a rack of barbecued baby back ribs with potato salad. Later, back in the motel room, I can’t sleep. I go outdoors and walk around until a lot later than I usually stay up, then come back and fall asleep in front of the TV. But my sleep is restless and punctuated with murky dreams. I’m up at five and on the road headed for home by seven.
Chapter 13
When I pull into my driveway mid-morning, I’m surprised to see my brother’s car in front. He’s sitting on the porch. My first thought is that whatever problem he has, I don’t need it. But I instantly feel bad for the thought. He is my brother, and his life has been harder than mine in every respect. Our mother was harder on him than she was on me, and he has taken after our daddy in easing his unhappiness with alcohol.
I hope it’s nothing to do with his wife showing up with bruises. When he’s drunk, Horace is maudlin and self-pitying, but I’ve never known him to become belligerent or violent when he’s drinking. Still, there’s a first time for everything.
“Hey, I didn’t
expect you. What’s up?”
“Where have you been? I was here last night and again this morning, and the place was locked up tight. That boy you have working around here told me he didn’t know when you were coming back. I figured I’d better wait it out.” As always, his tone is aggrieved, as if I should be here at his beck and call.
“I had to run up to Austin. I’m here now. Come on inside and I’ll make some coffee.”
Horace follows me inside, but as usual he seems uneasy in my house. I live very differently from my brother. I married a woman whose family is wealthy, and they shower us with gifts. I had a hard time with it at first, feeling it’s up to me to provide for my family. But Jeanne is frugal in most ways, not showy at all. She isn’t interested in wearing expensive jewelry or having a grand house. The only thing she spends money on is art.
In fact, that may be what makes Horace uneasy. Our furnishings are plain, and the house is nothing more than a spacious farmhouse, but our walls are hung with modern and abstract paintings that make no sense. They are expensive, and I know some of them are by well-known contemporary artists. The paintings are full of shapes, and some of them have nice colors, but they aren’t pictures of anything recognizable. Although Jeanne has tried to tell me why some people appreciate them, I don’t get the meaning of them, and I pretty much ignore them. But sometimes people who visit us are startled.
I make the coffee and scare up some cookies, and we take them out onto the front porch. Horace visibly relaxes and settles into a chair.
“What did you want to see me about?” I ask.
Horace is a few years older than me, but he looks a lot older. His hair is lank, his face deeply lined, and his body hunched as if he’s in pain. But the real difference is in his haunted eyes. He looks like a man who has lost hope. Except that I don’t remember him ever having any. “I wonder if we can leave Tom with you for a few days.”
“Of course you can. You know we love to have him.”
“Maybe even a week.”
