Evil at the Root

by Bill Crider

  “You know better than to ask that,” Mrs. Stuart said, folding her own hand and slipping it into the deck. “You have to pay to see.” She pulled the small pile of chips over to her side of the table, where she had already accumulated quite a stack.

  “How’re you, Sheriff?” she said.

  “Fine,” Rhodes said. “Been at it long?”

  “‘Bout an hour,” Mr. Stuart said. He had a tendency to talk a little louder than was really necessary. “Ivy come with you?”

  Ivy Daniel was Rhodes’s fiancée. They were going to be married in one week, on February 27.

  “Not this time,” Rhodes said. “I’m here on business.”

  “I bet it’s about those teeth,” Mr. Stuart said.

  “That’s right,” Rhodes told him. “Does everybody in here know everything that goes on?”

  “Pretty much,” Mrs. Stuart said. “There’s not much else to do except keep up with everybody’s business.”

  “What about the teeth, then? You know who took them?”

  Mrs. Stuart shook her head. It was a little wobbly on her thin neck. Her hair was completely white and very short. “Not yet, we don’t,” she said.

  “Not yet?”

  “She thinks she’s got a way to find out,” Mr. Stuart said. “I’ve got a bet with her for half my losses.”

  “He’ll lose on this, just like he does at cards,” Mrs. Stuart said. “I’ll just scoot down the hall in my walker when they feed us today, and I’ll watch to see who’s enjoyin’ himself the most while he eats. You can bet it’ll be somebody with new teeth, somebody who hasn’t been eatin’ well lately.”

  It sounded to Rhodes like as good a way as any to find out. “It wasn’t either one of you, was it?”

  Mr. Stuart grinned, exposing his own choppers, of which there appeared to be about six. “Got my own teeth,” he said proudly. “Don’t need anybody else’s.”

  “Me, too,” his wife said, though she didn’t offer to show them.

  “How about Maurice Kennedy?”

  Mrs. Stuart thought about it for a second or two. “Might’ve been. He strikes me as a sneaky type, all right. I’ll pay special attention to him. But he and Mr. Bobbit are supposed to be friends from way back.”

  Rhodes had never met Kennedy. “I’ll pay him a visit,” he said.

  “If you do that, I won’t have much of a chance to win my bet,” Mrs. Stuart said.

  Rhodes didn’t see any harm in letting the old woman have her fun. “I won’t talk to him until tomorrow, then.” he said. “But don’t try to do anything except look. I’ll tell Mr. Patterson that the case is in good hands.”

  “I’m still bettin’ she don’t find out,” Mr. Stuart said. “I figure to get back around three thousand dollars out of this.”

  “Ha,” Mrs. Stuart said. “You’ll just be nine thousand in the hole, is what you’ll be.”

  “We’ll see. Let’s play another hand or two. I feel lucky today. You want to sit in, Sheriff?” He was putting the cards into a mechanical shuffler that sat on the table.

  “No, thanks,” Rhodes said. “I’ve got to get back to the jail, see what’s going on around the county. I’ll see you two later.”

  “You bring Ivy next time,” Mr. Stuart said.

  “I’ll try to do that,” Rhodes assured him. He left the room and went back down the hail to Mr. Patterson’s office, told him that the investigation was continuing, and went back outside.

  “Ah ain’t got no teef!” Mr. Bobbit announced when Rhodes came through the doors.

  “I’m working on it,” Rhodes told him. He went to his car and got in.

  “Ah ain’t got no teef!” Mr. Bobbit yelled as Rhodes drove away.

  It was the last time Rhodes saw him alive.

  Chapter 2

  When Rhodes got back to the jail, Hack Jensen was in a state of high dudgeon, a condition Rhodes had read about but which he was pretty sure he’d never actually witnessed.

  There was no doubt that he was witnessing it now.

  Hack was even more outraged than Mr. Bobbit had been. If he’d been a cartoon character, smoke would have been pouring from his ears.

  Lawton, the jailer, was equally upset, hopping from one foot to the other. He was short and stout, and right now he was so red-faced that Rhodes thought a heart attack might be imminent.

  “What’s going on here?” Rhodes said. “You two look like you’re about to explode.”

  Hack, the dispatcher, was sitting at his table with the radio and telephone. He picked up a sheaf of papers and rattled them at Rhodes. “Upset? I guess I am! And you will be too, when you find out what’s goin’ on around here!”

  Rhodes had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. If he had to depend on Hack and Lawton to get the story told, he might not find out until the next week. Their main pleasure in life seemed to be knowing something that Rhodes didn’t know and making him wait as long as possible to find it out.

  He decided to give Lawton a try. “Do you know what he’s talking about?”

  “Do I know? Of course I know. Hell, he told me first off. It makes my blood boil, let me tell you.”

  “What does?” Rhodes asked.

  “Them papers, that’s what! I swear, I never in my life—”

  “What about the papers?” Rhodes asked.

  “We got ’em this mornin’, right after you left for the nursin’ home,” Hack said, avoiding the question.

  Rhodes gave it up. As always, he was going to get the story their way, and in their own good time. He went to his desk and sat down, leaning back a little in his chair.

  “All right,” he said when he was comfortable. “Let’s have it.”

  “Well,” Hack said, “this man came in lookin’ for you.”

  “Had on a dark blue suit,” Lawton added. “One of those with the fine little blue stripes in it, so fine you can’t hardly see ’em.”

  ‘Course we knew he was a lawyer right off,” Hack said. “Anybody dresses like that must be either a lawyer or a banker, and we don’t get a whole lot of bankers in the jail.”

  “Could’ve been a bondsman,” Lawton put in. “Couple of them wear suits.”

  “Wasn’t no bondsman, either,” Hack said.

  “Who was it?” Rhodes asked, hating himself for trying to get to the point. He knew it wouldn’t do any good.

  “Now that was the interestin’ part,” Lawton said. “We didn’t know who he was, and I guess we know about ever’ lawyer in Blacklin County, don’t we, Hack?”

  “You got that right. They’ve all been in here at one time or another, and if he was a local, we’d know him. But like Lawton said, we didn’t know him, which meant he wasn’t from around here.”

  “Turns out he’s some big dog from Harris County, here to bring those papers to us,” Lawton said. “That’s them over on Hack’s desk.”

  Hack picked up the papers and rattled them again. “That’s right,” he said. “This is them.”

  “And exactly what are they?” Rhodes asked, thinking that this time he might actually get an answer, not that he really wanted one now. He was pretty sure he wasn’t going to like it.

  “We’re bein’ sued,” Hack said.

  “That’s right,” Lawton said. “Sued!” He shook his head. “I never been sued before in my whole life.”

  “Who, exactly, is being sued?” Rhodes asked Hack. “You and Lawton?”

  “You’re damn right. And you, and the county, and the commissioners, and ever’body they can think of.”

  “Everybody who can think of?”

  Hack looked at Rhodes sorrowfully. “Who do you think?”

  “I can’t think of anyone,” Rhodes said, trying to be patient.

  “You remember that we had Little Barnes in here a while back?” Lawton said.

  Rhodes remembered.

  “And you remember how contentious him and his daddy always were?” Hack said.

  Rhodes remembered that, too.

  “Well, they
’re the ones suin’ us,” Hack said, shaking his head sadly. “You try to treat people right, and you see where it gets you.”

  “What are they suing us for?” Rhodes asked.

  “A million dollars,” Hack said.

  “Apiece,” Lawton said.

  Rhodes laughed. He couldn’t help it. He just started laughing. The idea that anyone could get a million dollars from him, much less from Hack and Lawton, was hilarious.

  The other two didn’t see the humor in it. They sat stony-faced and watched him laugh.

  “I’m glad you think it’s so funny,” Hack said. “You won’t be laughin’ for long, though.”

  “Why not?” Rhodes said when he had gotten control of himself.

  “‘Cause I think they’ve got a good case,” Hack said.

  Rhodes didn’t feel like laughing anymore. “Let’s hear it,” he said, and Hack finally told him.

  What it came down to was that Barnes had turned out to be a pretty fair jailhouse lawyer, and with his father’s help had gotten in touch with a real lawyer from Houston.

  They were suing Hack, Lawton, and Rhodes for neglect. They were suing the county for conditions in the jail, specifically the fact that there was no supervised exercise program for prisoners, no air conditioning, no central heating, a leaky roof, and bad plumbing.

  Rhodes was aware that, unfortunately, everything Barnes alleged was true, except the part about personal neglect. The jail was very old, after all, and though the county kept it up as best it could, it was certainly not a modern facility. There was no doubt they’d have to go to court, that the Commission on Jail Standards would investigate them, and that a number of changes would have to be made.

  There might even have to be a new jail, though Rhodes didn’t think there was any chance Barnes would collect any money.

  “If we do get a new jail,” Rhodes told Hack, “you could have that computer you’ve been wanting.”

  Lawton snickered, his mood suddenly improving. “He ain’t worried about that computer. He’s worried about that million dollars. ’Specially now that he’s got himself a girlfriend.”

  Rhodes grinned. Hack had met Mrs. McGee not long ago as a result of a murder case.

  “They been courtin’ right regular,” Lawton went on. “I figger we might have ourselves two weddin’s before long.”

  Hack didn’t think it was funny. “All right. You can laugh if you want to, but I bet you can’t afford a lawyer any more than I can.”

  Lawton admitted that he couldn’t. “I guess we can plead that we’re poverty-struck. They’ll have to let us off if we do that.”

  “I imagine the county will take care of things,” Rhodes told them. “Most of those charges will never even go to court. There’ll be a lot of bargaining back and forth before anything really happens.”

  He thought about what the county commissioners would say. If spending money were one of their favorite pastimes, there would have been a new jail long before now. He would have to talk to Jack Parry, the county judge, about things. That was the part he dreaded. The county fathers were not going to be pleased.

  “For now, I wouldn’t worry about it,” Rhodes told Hack and Lawton. “If anything does come of it, nothing will happen for a long time. And if you don’t have any money, they can’t take it away from you.”

  Hack didn’t look convinced. “They might try,” he said. “And besides, that ain’t the point. I don’t like somebody suin’ me for neglectin’ them. I never neglected nobody.”

  “He’s afraid they’ll throw him in the jail,” Lawton said. “Then he can’t see his sweet patootie.”

  “If they throw him in jail, then he can sue us,” Rhodes said.

  That cheered Hack up a little. “Now that’s not a bad idea. I’ll take all Lawton has left after Little Barnes gets his million.”

  “They aren’t going to get any of us for neglect, anyway, when it gets right down to it,” Rhodes said. “That’s just in there for haggling; All the times I’ve been to the county asking for a new roof or for better cooling are on the record over at the commissioner court, and some of the times I went before them, it was about requests you two had made for improvements. So there’s no reason to worry about whether you were neglectful.”

  He hoped he was telling the truth. Even though he knew that nobody in that room was guilty of neglect, there was still that nagging little fear that some lawyer just might be able to get them mired in a lawsuit that would take years to straighten out. No matter how farfetched it seemed, it was always a possibility.

  “I guess you’d better read the papers,” Hack said, getting up and handing them to Rhodes.

  Rhodes took them. He wasn’t looking forward to reading them, but he knew that he had to. He started flipping through the pages.

  Reading them thoroughly took him the rest of the morning.

  At noon Rhodes went over to the courthouse. He liked the old building with its high ceilings and marble floors, but he didn’t spend much time there, even though that was where his official office was located. There was a telephone there, but no one ever called. Anyone who wanted the sheriff called the jail, which is where Rhodes was most of the time when he was not out touring the county.

  He went up the broad walk to the courthouse, looking up at the clear blue sky through the bare branches of the pecan trees. There were a few crisp brown leaves on the dead grass and on the walk, but there were no pecans. The county allowed anyone who wanted the nuts to pick them up, and they could hardly fall before someone grabbed them.

  Rhodes’s office was on the second floor, right above the county clerk’s, one of the busiest offices in the building, since it was where everyone had to go to get their license plate stickers, to register to vote, transfer automobile titles, and perform similar items of important business.

  Over his head were the courtrooms of both the county and district courts, as well as some of the judges’ offices. There were some judges’ offices on the second floor as well, but they were usually quiet.

  That was the way Rhodes liked it. He could go to his official office and escape from the everyday worries of his job, and though he seldom did it, he liked the thought that the privacy was always there.

  He also liked the fact that he could get a Dr Pepper in a glass bottle in the courthouse, about the only place in the county where that was still possible.

  He got the soft drink from the old green-and-white machine and bought a package of Tom’s cheese and peanut butter crackers from the newer red machine beside it. He thought ruefully of his waistline. How could someone who ate cheese crackers for lunch not lose weight? Well, he didn’t. He had hoped to lose at least a few pounds before his marriage, but it didn’t seem likely. He had even ridden his stationary bicycle a few times in the past week, but he knew that it was too little, too late.

  He went to his office. Another thing he liked besides the quiet was that this room was completely uncluttered. There was, in fact, not a single thing on top of the desk except a few scratches left by Rhodes’s heels when he propped them there while relaxing in his chair.

  He added a few more scratches by sinking into the old leather office chair and putting his feet on the desk. He took a few satisfying sips of the icy cold Dr Pepper, ate two of the cheese crackers, and then picked up the phone and called Jack Parry, saying that he needed to talk.

  Parry walked down from the third floor to Rhodes’s office, which was more private than his own. He opened the door and walked in without knocking. Rhodes took his feet off the desk.

  “You going to back out?” Parry asked. He was a big man with only a fringe of close-cropped graying hair circling his bald head. He was chewing on an unlit cigar.

  Rhodes was momentarily at a loss.

  “Of the wedding,” Parry said, settling himself into a worn leather armchair. “You remember the wedding, don’t you?”

  “Oh, the wedding.” Rhodes remembered it, all right. He had asked Parry to perform the brief civil ceremony. He
wondered if the lawsuit would interfere with the wedding. “No, it’s not that.”

  “Didn’t think it was, to tell the truth. That Dennis Naylor came to see me, too.”

  “Dennis Naylor?”

  “That lawyer Little Barnes hired.”

  “Oh. Hack didn’t tell me his name.” Rhodes ate another cracker. “Just said he was a fancy lawyer.”

  Parry took the cigar out of his mouth and looked around for a place to put it. There wasn’t one, so he stuck it back where it had been. “That’s the kind of fella he was. He wouldn’t give you the time of day if there was a way he could charge you for it.”

  That bothered Rhodes. “How do you think Barnes can afford him?”

  “He’s working on a contingency, I expect. I’d bet he came up here and got a good look at the jail, from the outside anyway, before he took on the case. Once he saw that dump, he figured he couldn’t lose.”

  “I really appreciate you making me feel so much better about things,” Rhodes said, taking a drink from the bottle of Dr Pepper.

  Parry laughed. “Well, I can see where a man who’s about to tie the knot would be a little worried about finances. Ivy might not want to marry a pauper.”

  “It’s not the money part that worries me. It’s the part about the jail.”

  Parry grew serious. “That’s pretty worrisome, all right.” He looked around the office. “You got a trash can?”

  Rhodes pulled the round green metal trash can from the kneehole of the desk. “Right here.”

  Parry stood up and leaned over the desk. Seeing the trash can, he took out the wet cigar and threw it in. It hit the bottom with a damp, dull splat.

  Parry sat back down. “Now, where were we?”

  “Worrying about the lawsuit. The part about the jail.”

  “Yeah, the jail. You know that place where you are is a rat’s nest, don’t you?”

  “You preside at the commissioners’ meetings,” Rhodes reminded him.

  “Yeah. So you know. And you’ve told us more than once.” Parry leaned forward in his chair. “This is just between us, isn’t it?”

  “You know it is,” Rhodes said.