“I think that’s a good idea, Charlie,” Molly said. “It sure can’t hurt to have a good attorney in your corner when you’re dealing with the cops.”
He made his way over to his recliner. Slumping down into it with a low groan, he said, “You called the warden over in Huntsville?”
“Yeah. Louie Bronk’s in his cell.”
Charlie nodded as if he’d known it all along. “There’s someone else out there, then.” His voice was dispirited. “A copycat. Traynor showed me that stuff you got in the mail—poem and the pages about the murder. He asked if I knew anything about it. As if I’d know anything about that craziness.” His whole body seemed to slump even farther down in the chair. “So sick.”
Molly said, “Alison’s right; you need some sleep.”
“I reckon so. Molly, you haven’t asked me what it was I wanted to talk to you about.”
“I knew you’d get around to it when you felt up to it. You don’t have to tell me right now.”
He didn’t seem to hear her. “Well, I got to thinking about our talk yesterday and I felt bad about it. Sometimes I get a little crazy on trying to control things. I wanted to tell you if you still wanted that interview, I was willing to talk about it—on the record. I think I have some things to say I’d like printed, might do some good. As for my children, they’ll do what they want no matter what I do so I might as well give up. Of course now isn’t a good time, but I’ll carry through on this if you want—when I feel better.”
Molly knew that the humane thing was to say it wouldn’t be necessary; it might be too much of a strain for him. But that cold part of her mind that was always hunting for the good story just couldn’t allow that. Now more than ever she wanted to hear what he had to say. “Thank you, Charlie,” she said. “When you’ve gotten some sleep.”
About to leave, she thought of something that had been bothering her. “Charlie, about Frank Purcell—was he directly involved in the Bronk investigation when he was a Ranger in Hays County?”
He looked up as if he were slow in registering the question. “Frank? Directly involved? Oh, I think there was so much to do early on with all Bronk’s confessions that all of them down there got involved some. Why?”
“Just wondered. I recognized him from when I was going down there as a reporter. He’s been working for you eight years?”
“For my company, yes. A damn good man, best we’ve had. The Rangers train ’em good.” He struggled to his feet. “Well, I guess I will try some sleep. This has been one hell of a day and tomorrow’s not gonna be much better. The condolences again. God. I’ve had enough condolences for a lifetime.”
Molly wanted to take his elbow and help him, but she restrained herself. “It’ll get worse before it gets better. But you already know that.”
His left eye twitched involuntarily. “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “Unfortunately, I do know. And this is going to be worse than last time, if that’s possible.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “If that’s possible,” he repeated.
chapter 8
Oh man, sweating feels so sweet,
I do my best work in the heat.
A hundred degrees,
Not a breath of breeze.
I find someone,
Have my fun,
Do what I do
And when I’m through
I feel that gush, a red-hot flood
And I am fucking sweating blood.
LOUIE BRONK
Death Row, Ellis I Unit,
Huntsville, Texas
It was nearly ten when Molly Cates drove out of the McFarland driveway. She recognized the white Ford Tempo parked in the bushes across the street as an unmarked police car, but she drove right by.
In her rearview mirror she watched the car pull behind her, tail-gating her in the aggressive way cops do when they want you to sweat it out. She turned onto Greystone, staying right at the speed limit, and smiled when she saw the concealed lights under the grille begin to flash, throwing red and blue beams into her truck.
Molly rolled down the window and kept driving. She felt transported, as if she were seventeen again, riding in an open convertible with her hair streaming in the wind and a beer can in her hand. She threw her head back and laughed. When she’d gotten almost to Mesa, she pulled over to the side and waited, staring straight ahead through the windshield.
The white car pulled up behind her, its light still whirling.
His shoes crunched the gravel shoulder as he approached. His flashlight flickered into the back seat, then around the front. He let out a low whistle. “Some fancy custom interior you got here.” Finally he looked at her. “Howdy, ma’am. See your driving license please.”
“Didn’t bring it with me, Officer,” Molly said, still staring forward.
“How about some other identification then. A library card or your voter registration.”
“I forgot my purse, Officer. I don’t have any identification. What was I doing wrong?”
“Doing wrong? Why, not a thing that I know of. This here is just a routine traffic check. Could you get out of the vehicle, please, ma’am?”
Slowly Molly turned her head and looked at Grady Traynor. His head and shoulders filled the window. In the flashing light, the deep seams that ran the length of both cheeks looked like saber scars and his eyes, which were just a shade paler than Oriental Avenue on the Monopoly board, seemed transparent.
“I believe this sounds like the beginning of an illegal search, Sergeant.”
“Lieutenant,” he corrected.
“Oh, yes. Lieutenant!” she said. “Well, Lieutenant. I refuse to get out of my car. I’ve heard about all this po-lice brutality and I’m just a poor widow-woman trying to make a living as best I can—”
He snorted. “Widow-woman!”
“Well, yes. My third husband did die.”
“Yeah, four years after you divorced him.”
“So,” she said with a smile of satisfaction, “you’ve been keeping track.”
He sighed and switched off the flashlight. “I suppose I have. How about following me over to the Cadillac Bar?” He leaned in the open window, so close she could smell that he still used English Leather after-shave. “Maybe we could have us a drink there and talk this situation over real peacefullike.”
Molly broke the mood; she couldn’t help herself. “What would what’s-her-name, Jane, say about that?”
“Janine. It’s not a problem.”
“Oh?”
“I’ll tell you all about it, if you come.”
Molly hesitated, but the outcome was never in doubt. Just like the outcome was never in doubt when she was a seventeen-year-old orphan, a high school dropout being seduced by a twenty-four-year-old rookie patrolman. Now, as then, her curiosity was fueled as much by hormones as by interest in the way things turn out in the end.
Molly had never been to the Cadillac Bar. It was a fairly new place on Red River, only a few blocks north of police headquarters. As they entered, several men at the bar, whom she recognized as off-duty policemen, turned their heads and watched as she and Grady walked to a booth in the back. Grady stood aside for Molly to slide into the semicircular booth, then he slid in next to her and took his jacket off, quickly transferring his pistol from his belt to the jacket pocket.
“Molly,” he said in his official voice, “I want to warn you about something: if you have in mind writing anything about this murder—even so much as a word—forget about it.”
Molly crossed her arms over her chest. “Don’t try to bully me, Grady; you know I hate that. You promised some personal revelations, a nice chat. If you’ve brought me here under false pretenses, I’m leaving.”
“Let’s get this out of the way first,” he said. “I’m not sure yet how we’re going to handle this with the media, but you know we’ll withhold some details, details you were in a position to observe. So I want you to assure me you will not write anything about what you’ve seen or heard at the scene today, or any other insid
e stuff you’ve gotten, including that crazy stuff you got in the mail. This case is off-limits for you until I tell you different.”
“Grady, do you know you’re the third man in the last thirty hours to tell me what I shouldn’t write? You may remember how I feel about men trying to boss me around.”
He rolled his eyes upward. “How could I forget!” Then he looked at her with interest. “Who else tried to boss you around?”
“Yesterday Charlie McFarland tried to bribe me not to write anything more about his first wife’s murder and not to interview his kids for the article I’m planning on Louie Bronk’s execution.”
“Bribe you with what?”
“One hundred thousand bucks, in the guise of a writing award.”
He let out a low wolf whistle. “Well, I find that highly interesting. Who else?”
“My boss at Lone Star Monthly, Richard Dutton, vetoed the article this morning. Said he’d fire me if I went ahead and did it the way I want to.”
“Well, good luck to them—trying to persuade you of anything. But this is different, Molly. I’m not trying to persuade you, or bribe you. I’m ordering you. If you write about this without checking it out with me, I’ll make sure no one in the Department ever tells you the time of day again. You may remember how I regard press interference in police business.”
“Oh, I surely do,” she said.
He nodded to indicate an end to the subject, leaned back against the booth, and said, “McFarland says he asked you to come to his house today to tell you he’d changed his mind and he would cooperate with you after all.”
“That’s what he told me, too.”
“When did he tell you that?”
“Just now, before I left the house.”
“I wonder why he didn’t tell you that when he called earlier.” He raised his eyebrows. “From his private plane.”
“He’s a man who likes to wield power and one way he does that is to get people to come to him.”
“And you were willing to let him do that?” He narrowed his eyes.
“Sure. I was curious.”
He grinned. “Yeah,” he said slowly, “I remember that about you.”
She looked down at the table to avoid his eyes. “I wanted the interview; it’s how I make my living. And as I told you, we had an ongoing discussion about the article I’m planning on Louie Bronk.”
“Oh, yes. Louie Bronk. I suppose I’m going to have to ferret out the old case files on him. I was in IA back then, but I sure remember Louie Bronk. And of course I know he’s one of your obsessions.”
Molly decided not to take the bait. She had a good excuse since the waitress was approaching their table. She wore a Mexican peasant blouse dipping off one shoulder and an expression of utter world-weariness. Molly ordered a Coors Light and Grady ordered a frozen strawberry daiquiri.
When the waitress left, Molly laughed. “You’ve got to be the only homicide detective in Texas who drinks strawberry daiquiris.”
He didn’t smile. “Molly, I can’t let this go until I get a commitment from you. I have a feeling about this case. I’m going to give you some good advice; write about the Bronk burning if you feel you must, but leave Charlie McFarland out of it for now. Don’t see him. Don’t talk to him. Don’t write about him.”
“Thank you for the advice, Grady. That must mean you actually think he did it.”
He planted his elbows on the table and glared at her. “You know the percentages. Odds are ten-to-one when a wife is dead, her old man did it. Here we have an older husband, beautiful younger wife. She probably had a lover—you know how it goes with women, don’t you, Molly?” His glance was sharp. “He finds out, he’s jealous, he shoots her. The old story.”
“Yeah. I’ve heard it. Is it your theory he did it himself or had someone else do it?”
He paused, then said, “I see two itsy-bitsy problems with his having done it himself, but nothing I can’t deal with. I can talk about this to you because you already know most of it and also because you know if you breathe a syllable of it, I’ll slam you in jail for obstructing justice, right?”
Molly nodded to keep him going.
“Purcell says when he got there this morning at exactly ten minutes to seven to take his boss to the airport, he went into the bedroom to carry his briefcase for him—seems McFarland has a back problem—and he heard McFarland shouting to Georgia who was in the shower, or so McFarland says, and Purcell could hear that the shower was on. But he didn’t actually hear Georgia’s voice or see her. That’s number one. Number two is that Purcell saw a stainless-steel Thermos leaning against the back door. He identified it as identical to the one found next to the body.”
“What was in the Thermos?”
He laughed. “What I love about you, Molly, is that there’s no predicting your questions. Coffee. And it was still hot, since that’s probably your next question. She was cold and the coffee was hot. A great Thermos.”
Molly said nothing.
“McFarland and Purcell left the house together at a few minutes before seven and Purcell saw the Thermos at the door as they left.”
“What about the shower? Was it still running?”
“Purcell couldn’t hear because by then they were in the kitchen, too far away to hear.”
“And you’ve checked that Charlie was with people all day after that, right?”
“On the plane, meetings in Dallas all day, then on the plane again, and Purcell drove him home. No way he could have come back before you found the body.”
“Purcell’s a good witness?”
“According to our preliminary check, Molly. He was with the Rangers seventeen years, excellent record, quit to make more money in corporate security. And, anyway, if he was lying, he would of said he’d actually seen the lady as they left. No. This sounds like truth.”
“So if Charlie killed her,” Molly said flatly, “he would have had to kill her before he left with Purcell at seven. A lot is going to depend on the ME’s time of death.”
Grady let out a long sigh. “You know those things are about as reliable as the fucking rhythm method.”
“Yeah. So if he did it himself, how would you explain those two things?”
“Easy for a smart guy like that. The shower thing—he just turned it on and talked to it so Purcell would hear, turned it off before he left. And the Thermos—well, he just had a duplicate he’d left with the body down the hill before Purcell got there.”
“And how did he get rid of the Thermos he’d left in the house?” she asked.
“While Purcell was down the hill with you and the corpse, he hid it.”
“But you didn’t find it when you searched the house.”
“Nope. But that doesn’t mean much.”
Molly digested this in silence for a minute. “You know,” she said, “his back is so bad he can barely walk.”
“So he says. But it doesn’t matter. Rich guy like that—he could hire the whole thing done.”
“Why would he, Grady?”
“Damned if I know—yet.” He grinned at her. “They’d been married almost two years. According to McFarland she had no money of her own. No enemies. Even his kids liked her, he swears. Imagine that—being liked by your stepchildren.”
“Where were they?”
“The kids? Well, young Alison was asleep in bed in South Austin with her live-in boyfriend, who happens to be her first cousin, until six-thirty when the cousin got up to run and then went on to work without coming back. She studied at home without seeing or talking to anyone all morning.”
“What about Stuart?”
“Stuart McFarland started his shift at the hospital at five this morning, but nothing much was going on so he slept in one of the rooms until nine when business got going. He doesn’t think anyone can vouch for that.”
“What about business enemies of Charlie?”
Grady toyed with his drooping mustache and watched the waitress approaching with their drinks. “He sa
ys he’s got some. We’ll check them out, of course, but that will come up dry. The wife didn’t have anything to do with his business.”
The waitress set their drinks in front of them and left.
“Molly,” Grady said, still toying with his mustache, “save me some time here. You’re more familiar than anybody with the murder of Charlie McFarland’s first wife. I’ll read the case files tonight, but tell me something about it.”
“It’s all in my book. Read it.”
He grinned. “Nah. I’m waiting till they make it into a movie, and then I’ll probably wait until it comes out in video. Just give it to me now in a nutshell.”
“How many words are there in a nutshell, Grady?”
“About five hundred.”
“Okay. It was eleven years ago, in July. Tiny and Charlie lived out west of the city on fifteen acres off City Park Road. Charlie was an up-and-coming builder-developer, self-made. She was a little bit of a thing, ninety pounds, blond, sort of a society matron, an heiress; her daddy owned a chain of department stores. The children were young—Stuart was fourteen and Alison was eleven. Tiny was gone a lot, most of the time, actually—tennis, charity work, parties, travel—that sort of thing—so they had a live-in baby-sitter, David Serrano, age twenty-one, a part-time student at ACC. He lived in an apartment over the garage.”
Molly took a sip of her beer. Grady still hadn’t touched his daiquiri.
“About eleven o’clock on the morning of July ninth,” Molly continued, “Serrano hears a shot, goes down to check, and finds Mrs. McFarland in the garage, dead, naked except for a pair of white panties, her head shaved. He sees a car driving out of the driveway—an old white car with a brown door on the driver’s side. Just then the daughter, Alison, emerges from the house, in time to see the car drive off. He hustles her back inside and calls the police. Meanwhile, young Stuart arrives home on his bicycle to find his mother lying dead. The cops arrive in fifteen minutes. She’d been shot once in the back with a .22 caliber bullet. She hadn’t been raped. David Serrano was their chief suspect at first—young, Hispanic, helpless—you know what cops are like. They tried to pin all the Scalper murders on him.”
The Red Scream Page 11
