Greasy Bend

by Kris Lackey

  There were shots in the distance.

  “This was not some Circle-K grab-and-go in Moriarty, Calls. You killed the father of two little girls. For what? Some fistfuls of casino cash?” Maytubby grabbed his collar, pulled him up. With his left hand, Maytubby took plasticuffs from the back of his duty belt; then he pulled Calls’ arms back and fastened the cuffs on his wrists. “Walk,” he said.

  When Maytubby and his prisoner gained the clearing beside the bridge approach, Renaldo was marching a tall man in cuffs, at the point of a pistol, up off the beach onto the bank. Renaldo carried a rifle in his left hand. “Bill. Hannah.” He nodded. “How’d you guys draw a damned army down here?”

  Sleet now poured over Greasy Bend in wind-driven whorls.

  “It’s a big outfit, Jake,” Maytubby said, squinting against the ice. “Robbery, drugs, embezzlement, blank-receiver guns.”

  Renaldo and Maytubby ordered their prisoners to kneel. “I thought there were three bodies,” Renaldo said, “but one was a passed-out drunk. I moved his gun a little farther out of reach. Can you watch Slats here while I radio Dispatch for the medical examiner and OSBI? I’ll pick up the drunk’s gun on the way.

  “Sure. Thanks,” Maytubby said.

  As Renaldo jogged across the bridge toward his cruiser, Hannah said, “I got a nice, warm ride back to Mercy in the ambulance. You got a long, cold wait for the bureaucrats. My back hurts like a son of a bitch.”

  The sleet changed to snow, which grew on the grass and limbs, silencing the bottomland. Maytubby and Bond stood still, exhaling clouds of vapor.

  The roar of a big engine approached from the east on Greasy Bend Road. They turned and watched for the ambulance from Tishomingo.

  From the snowfall emerged a large white pickup with a big pipe grille. It was coming fast and showed no sign of slowing.

  “Got-damn,” Bond said. She grabbed James by the belt and dragged him to the far ditch. He cried out like an animal. “Is there no end to these turd-knockers?” she shouted, as she unholstered her revolver.

  The other captives looked up as the truck approached. Maytubby raised his Beretta in both hands and aimed at the driver. The pickup slid to a stop. Maytubby recognized Rooster at the wheel. The man’s little eyes menaced the scene only a second before he raised a pistol, not at Maytubby but at the kneeling tall prisoner. His first shot and Maytubby’s, both through the Supercab pickup’s windows, were simultaneous. The tall prisoner fell backward. Taking Maytubby’s round, Rooster jerked to his left, recovered, and swung his pistol down toward Calls. Maytubby and the Rooster again fired at once. The Rooster’s shot struck Calls in the chest, and Maytubby’s hit the Rooster’s right shoulder.

  The Rooster pitched over on the bench seat, both shoulders bleeding. His pistol fell on the floor. Maytubby and Bond ran to the pickup, pistols in hand, and flung open its opposite doors. The Rooster, his thin head bent, was heaving. Maytubby stared into the tiny yellow eyes. The Rooster coughed up a laugh. “Nobody left to squeal like a pig.”

  “Maybe,” Maytubby said as he took the shooter’s gun.

  “He’s a ugly bastard,” Hannah said.

  Ambulances from Tish and Ardmore moved up Greasy Bend Road from opposite directions as Renaldo ran back across the snow-covered bridge. As he approached the pickup, he said, “Who the hell is this?”

  “The next-to-last player,” Maytubby said. “Whoever owns this truck, which was the getaway at Golden Play, and the vehicle that—”

  “The railroad killer,” Renaldo said.

  “Yeah,” Bond said.

  “He’s the last one,” Maytubby said.

  “Troop F had news on that,” Renaldo said. “Woman in Ada shot a home intruder. An accomplice fled the scene in a truck like this. ’Bout half an hour ago.”

  “Jake, can you cover my prisoner and this guy?” Maytubby said.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’ll go back to James,” Hannah said.

  Maytubby had to walk to the middle of the bridge to get a signal bar on his phone. When he called Jill, she picked up just before voice mail.

  “Are you okay?” he said.

  “Who told you?”

  “Renaldo. Baby, are you okay?”

  “Baby? You never …”

  “Jill?”

  He heard her inhale deeply. “Yes, Bill. I am pretty much okay. The other guy is not okay, but he is alive. The police and EMTs are here.”

  “The freedman’s Springfield?”

  “Yup. I’m pretty shaky. And freezing. I’m in my robe, and the front door is still open. There’s snow blowing in. How …” The connection died.

  Maytubby walked in circles until he got a bar on the phone. When Jill answered, he said, “Hannah is fine. She dived in the Washita until she found a pistol. She was cold as a corpse when I got here. But she brought lots of blankets. Said to tell you thanks for yours.”

  “She’s welcome. Officers, can I go get a coat?”

  Maytubby heard one of them agree. After some seconds, Jill said, “There. Much better. And I think I need gloves.”

  “Jill, listen, the guys in cahoots?”

  “Yeah?”

  “All but the two who visited you came to see Hannah and me on the Washita. There was an ugly episode. Some people are dead.”

  “Episode? Oh, God. What a word.”

  “Hannah is accompanying one suspect in the ambulance to Tish. I have to wait here with Renaldo until the medical examiner and OSBI get here. Might be an hour and a half before I can leave. You want to go somewhere else for a while?”

  “No. I’m not superstitious. But I am going to finish that Viognier. Fry an egg. I’m told I can’t ‘disturb’ the crime scene. The wine and egg won’t do that, you think?”

  Maytubby heard the sangfroid return to Jill’s voice. “The Rooster came here from there,” he said. He’s also alive but out of commission. You shot the kingpin, you know?”

  “The big hairy guy the EMTs are lifting onto a stretcher just now?”

  “That guy.”

  “He fell on my banjo and busted it.”

  “The evil that men do after you’ve taken them down.”

  “I’m getting the wine, baby. And I’m taking the day off.”

  “Be there in a couple of hours.”

  Maytubby hit the red button on his cell and looked down from the bridge. Snow was bleaching the corpses. The muddy Washita creased its banks like blood on a starched sheet.

  CHAPTER 39

  Snow whirled into the cab of the F-100 as Maytubby pulled the hand choke and started the engine. It had been photographed, measured, and dusted for so long, Maytubby had to call his fiancée to tell her he’d be late. He surveyed the hive of law enforcement vehicles and bustling forensic troops from OSBI, the knot of remote television news trucks with their antennas raised as high as they could go, swaying in the wind. Even Johnston County sheriff Magaw had made an appearance. Maytubby had declined all media requests for interviews. Scrooby and Magaw had not.

  Maytubby waved at Renaldo and a couple of Highway Patrol officers from Troop F. He moved the column shifter into first and inched down Greasy Bend Road. The drive on Oklahoma 1 to Nichole Hewitt’s house in Mill Creek took fifteen minutes. Maytubby squinted against the wind and snow.

  His teeth were chattering when he pulled into the Hewitts’ driveway, his pickup crunching pecan hulls as it neared the house. Before he could open the door, Nichole, her mother, and the girls filed out the front door, wearing winter coats and Sunday shoes. The girls wore short coats, under them long dresses.

  When Nichole saw Maytubby, her swollen eyes widened. She turned to her mother and said something. Her mother ushered the girls back inside.

  Maytubby got out of his truck. Nichole hugged her coat and came down the steps to meet him. They embraced in the falling snow and then stood apart.
“Bill, what happened to your truck?”

  He looked toward the house and then exhaled, lowered his head, and shook it. “Tommy’s funeral!” he said.

  “Yeah,” she said, pulling her coat even tighter. “Ten o’clock. What happened to your truck, Bill?”

  “I’m going to miss Tommy’s funeral,” he said. His eyes smarted. “I’m so sorry, Nichole.”

  “What happened?”

  Maytubby wiped his nose with his coat sleeve. “The gang who robbed Golden Play? There was a firefight down by Ravia early this morning. This is no time to burden you with details. But the man I believe shot Tommy was shot and killed by another member of the gang.”

  Nichole grimaced and sank her chin into her coat. “It’s all so horrible,” she whispered.

  “Yes. It is. His name was Duncan Calls. A Chickasaw citizen and a crook who had lived out of the state a long time. OSBI is at the scene, collecting evidence.”

  Nichole kept her head down and reached for Maytubby’s arm. “Thank God you’re not hurt,” she said. She withdrew her hand, raised her head, and looked him in the eye. “We have to go,” she said.

  He nodded. “Hug the girls for me,” he said. He looked around. “And Jill …” He wavered. “… has come down hard with the flu.”

  Nichole was weeping when she turned her head toward the house and nodded.

  Maytubby watched her mount the steps. He got in his truck and drove toward Ada.

  CHAPTER 40

  Maytubby and Jill hugged on the tiny landing where the stairs going up to her apartment made a right angle. Jill had changed into blue jeans and a gray cable-knit sweater. They kissed a long time, rocking a little.

  Jill said, “It seems like weeks since we burnt the squash.” Snowflakes melted on her black hair. They hugged again. “Mmmmm …” She jerked her head back. “Shit! The old Ford! I didn’t see it. What the Sam Hill happened down there? It doesn’t even have a windshield!”

  Maytubby, still holding her, turned to regard the truck and then looked back at her. “More important than that is what happened in your apartment. You are strong. But being awakened in the night by a man who breaks down your door. And then having to shoot him to save your own life. That’s ugly.”

  “It was.”

  “And I didn’t see it coming. Didn’t think the pilot of that dubious Cessna in Cache might glass the Ford’s tag. Or that he might have a mole who could run the plate and tie you and Hannah and me together with online news stories about the Hillers mess at Nail’s Crossing last summer. I’m sorry, Jill.”

  She smiled weakly. “Can you call me ‘baby’ again? It was so not like you.”

  “I love you, baby.”

  “Ah-h,” she sighed.

  “Badass,” he growled.

  She nodded. “Today.”

  They exhaled together, the vapor of their breath trailing over the banisters.

  As they turned and walked up the second flight, Maytubby said, “I stopped by Nicho … the Hewitts’ house in Mill Creek.”

  Before they opened the splintered door, Jill stopped and faced Maytubby. He said, “Nichole and her mother and the girls were leaving for Tommy’s funeral.”

  Jill gasped and put her hand to her mouth. “Oh, God. I …”

  “It’s okay. I told Nichole you had the flu. She’ll learn the truth when it needs to be told. Her mother took the girls inside before I told her that the man I think killed Tommy—his name is Duncan Calls—was shot and killed by one of his own gang down on the Washita this morning.”

  Jill grasped Maytubby’s coat by its lapels and gazed into the falling snow. “It was cold comfort,” she said.

  “Yes,” he said. “We know her well.” They stood very still for some minutes, the thick snow falling.

  “Let’s go inside,” she said.

  CHAPTER 41

  Ten days later, on a sunny Saturday, Hannah, Maytubby, and Jill slid into a leatherette booth at Polo’s Mexican Restaurant on Main Street in Ada. The place was crowded at noon. Hannah and Maytubby, both off shift, wore civvies—Hannah a denim shirt and denim jeans, Maytubby a pale-blue oxford button-down shirt and beige corduroy pants. Jill wore blue jeans and a black turtleneck sweater.

  A server brought them waters and started to hand out menus. Hannah held up her hand and said, “We been here before. We know what we want. I’ll have steak fajitas. She,” she said, pointing at Jill, “will have cheese enchiladas. This guy”—she pointed at Maytubby—“will have all the beans and rice and guacamole and lettuce and stuff that comes with my order. I just want the meat. They”—she waved at Jill and Maytubby—“don’t take much to meat.” She winked at Maytubby. The server nodded and scurried away.

  Hannah narrowed her eyes at Jill. “I hear you shot Bluto in your living room with your great-great-granddaddy’s old Springfield twice-barrel.”

  The server brought a basket of chips and some ramekins of pico sauce. Hannah dug in. “Good for you,” she said, gnawing a chip. “Made that bastard eat his vegetables.”

  Jill closed her eyes and nodded.

  Hannah sat back and frowned. “At the graveside, we put Alice’s ashes not ten feet from that old racist Governor Alfalfa Bill Murray, if you can believe it.” The table went quiet, only kitchen sounds in the back.

  “Now, Sergeant,” Hannah said, “I didn’t want to hear from Scrooby—least of all from Magaw—what-all has happened since the shoot-out at the bridge. I told them all I’d wait and hear it from you.” She folded her arms across her chest, closed her eyes, and leaned back in the booth.

  Maytubby tapped his nails on the table. “Jill has heard all this—and that Pitts stove in the door of my house just before he went to her place. So. You remember the ugly guy,” he said to Hannah. To Jill he said, “The Rooster. The guy I shot in the cab, said he had killed everyone who would squeal like a pig?”

  Hannah kept her eyes closed and nodded.

  “He squealed—on his boss, Bluto, the guy Jill shot. The boss’ name is Jared Pitts. Pitts drove the white pickup in the Golden Play robbery. He controlled the whole Sentinel Vending shell company that ferried drugs and blank receivers all over southern Oklahoma and north Texas. OSBI raided the Powell Road compound and the Gill Janitorial office at the airport. ATF stormed the white-supremacist encampment in Paris. The night before the raid, the Nazis shot up an empty Hispanic church, Puerta del Cielo, outside Paris, with bump-stock rifles.”

  The fajitas arrived on a cart pushed by a server. She poured vodka from a portion cup over the meat and set it aflame with a long barbecue lighter. When the fire died, she used potholders to move the metal-in-wood plate to the table. Then she served the other dishes.

  Hannah did not move to eat but remained with her eyes closed and her arms across her chest.

  Maytubby looked at his vegetables. “OSBI found that Pitts managed James’ money. They have the torn glove you finally gave them, Hannah. They recovered James’ prints on the pistol you found in the river. Cold river water preserved the oils. And their ballistics team matched the bullet they recovered from Alice with the gun. Also, your cadet found a blond whisker in Alice’s house before you got there. The pilot from Cache remains at large.”

  “Go on,” Hannah said.

  “Teague, Sulak, Calls, the welder—I don’t recall his name—the tall fellow, whose name was Dorko, and Lon Crum all died in the gunfight. The drunk guard from Powell Road is in Johnston County jail, as you know, Hannah. The FBI, back when they didn’t know a Chickasaw had killed a Chickasaw in Indian Country, looked into Calls’ computer and found an Amazon receipt for a batch of temporary tattoos, including the satyr tat Calls was wearing when he shot Tommy Hewitt.”

  Hannah still sat with her eyes closed. “And Richard James?” she said.

  “He’s in OU Med Center in Oklahoma City, charged with first-degree murder in the death of Alice Lang.”


  Jill and Maytubby looked at Hannah. She opened her eyes. “Pitts?”

  “Also in OU Med Center, charged with first-degree murder in the railroad killing and with many other federal charges.”

  “I hate to say it, but Scrooby did the Lord’s work.” Hannah unfolded her arms, took her water glass in hand, and raised it above the fajitas. “Here’s to keepin’ the powers of darkness at bay.”

  Maytubby and Jill raised their glasses.

  After they drank and set their glasses on the table, Hannah said, “I’m starvin’. Let’s eat.”

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I am deeply indebted to my gifted editor, Michael Carr, whose skill and cheer go above and beyond.

  Warm thanks to my wife, Karleene Smith, for detecting vague passages in the first manuscript.

  Jason O’Neill, former Chickasaw Lighthorse chief of police, patiently explained the basics of tribal jurisdiction. Any errors on this score are mine alone. Staff at the Lighthorse Police have answered my telephone queries in helpful detail.

  My dear friends Sarah Miracle and Jill Fox supplied details about nutrition education. Jason Eyachabbe introduced me to the Chickasaw language and demonstrated the rudiments of stickball. Cody Dixon was a thorough guide on our tour of the Kullihoma Grounds.

  Warm thanks to others who commented on the manuscript: Jim Rosenthal, Mary Bess Whidden, and Desiree Hupy.

  Robert Kelson and Paul Swenson, both retired law enforcement officers, answered my amateur’s questions patiently. They did not begrudge my poetic license with police procedure.

  Drs. Michael and Myrna Pontious graciously provided medical observations.

  Thanks to Danuta Press, who presided elegantly over the Norman roll-out of Nail’s Crossing.