Bone Dry (Blanco County Mysteries)

by Ben Rehder

  “Unless he’s innocent.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Unless he’s innocent.”

  “Well, yeah,” Wylie said. “Of course.”

  On the way to the jail, Marlin stopped at a convenience store and made a quick purchase. Three minutes later, he was checking in with the jailer, leaving his .357 revolver at the desk.

  Marlin went into the visitation room, sat at the small, scarred pine table, and waited. Five minutes later, the door leading to the cells opened and Jack Corey walked in, wearing blue jailhouse clothes. His left arm was in a cast.

  “Come on in, Jack,” Marlin said. “Grab a chair.”

  Corey mumbled a greeting and took a seat. The man looked awful. Dark bags under his eyes. Greasy, unwashed hair. A couple of days’ worth of beard.

  After Corey got settled, Marlin asked, “You doing all right, Jack? What happened to your arm?”

  Corey eyed him skeptically. “You didn’t hear?”

  Marlin shook his head.

  “That asshole Wylie nailed me with his nightstick. Fractured my wrist.”

  “Before or after you popped him in the eye?”

  “After,” Corey admitted grudgingly, staring at the floor. “He deserved it though.”

  “You wanna tell me what happened?”

  Corey raised his left arm and set it down on the table with a loud plonk. “He was all over me, telling me how he knew what I did and I was gonna end up in Huntsville. Kept describin’ how the needle would feel going into my arm, tryin’ to rattle me. But he wouldn’t listen to a goddamn word I had to say.” Corey lifted his head and met Marlin’s eyes. “John, I had nothin’ to do with Gammel gettin’ shot. I swear to God. Man, you’ve known me for, what, nearly forty years? You know I wouldn’t do somethin’ like that, right?”

  Marlin took a deep breath and leaned forward. “Jack, I have to say, it doesn’t sound like something you’d do. And if you’re not involved, all I can tell you is to sit tight and wait, because we’ve found some things that should help us clear this up. But Jack, if something did happen between you and Bert Gammel, that same evidence is going to tell Wylie the complete story. There won’t be any getting out of it, because science doesn’t lie.”

  Marlin noticed that Corey was still steadily meeting his gaze, a good sign.

  “What I’m saying, Jack, is that if something pissed you off enough to lose your head, to do something stupid, now’s the time to come clean and tell us. You know how the prosecutor is. He’s willing to take a plea when a guy owns up to what he did. On the other hand, when a guy clams up and the deputies have to follow the case all the way to the end, for a crime like this…well, things can get kind of rough.”

  Corey shook his head. “John, I’m tellin’ ya—you can give me one of those lie-detector tests or whatever, but all it will ever show is that I didn’t do it. I don’t give a damn what Wylie says or what he believes, he’s got the wrong guy. And there ain’t no way I’m gonna confess to something I didn’t do.”

  Marlin’s intuition, honed from dealing with hundreds of poachers over the years, told him Corey was telling the truth. Of course, Marlin remembered all too well the times he had been fooled by a good lie.

  “Tell me a little bit about your problems with Gammel, the arguments you had at the deer lease.” As he spoke, Marlin pulled an item out of his hip pocket. It was the pouch of Red Man chewing tobacco he had purchased earlier at the store.

  “Aw, man, it wasn’t nothin’, really. He shot spikes all the time and threw ’em in the ditch. I thought it was a goddamn waste, and almost called you a couple of times.”

  Marlin opened the package and stuffed a small amount of tobacco in his jaw.

  “The only time it was really a problem,” Corey said, “was this one time we got into an argument and he took a swing at me. But all the guys were there and can tell you it was his fault, not mine. Even Lester showed up and can tell you what happened.”

  Marlin laid the tobacco pouch on the table and noticed Corey eyeing it.

  “How come you won’t let Wylie search your house and truck?”

  Corey looked confused. “Hell, he can search all he wants. He never asked.”

  Marlin was stunned. “He didn’t ask permission?”

  “No, but I woulda told him to go right ahead. I ain’t got nothin’ to hide.”

  Marlin figured Wylie probably had been afraid to show his hand, to let Corey know a search was coming.

  “Well, I’ll let him know you said it was okay, then,” Marlin said. He paused and looked around the drab room. “Not exactly the Hyatt, is it? They treating you all right?”

  Corey shrugged. “Yeah, no problem. But I need to get back to work. I’m self-employed, and when I don’t work, I don’t get paid.”

  “You want anything? Maybe a Coke...” Marlin slid the Red Man toward Corey. Time for the test. Was Corey a tobacco user or not? “Or a chew?”

  Corey glanced at the package. “Naw, not right now. Maybe later.”

  “All right, Jack,” Marlin said.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Marlin had finished dinner and was headed out the door when Bobby Garza called. The sheriff said, “Listen, if you’ve got a minute, I wanted to talk to you about Jack Corey.”

  Marlin glanced at the clock. Six forty-five. Inga’s assembly started in fifteen minutes. “What’s up?”

  “Well, Wylie is right in the middle of this thing, but I just wanted to hear your thoughts. You talked to Corey this morning?”

  “For about fifteen minutes. Went over it with Wylie on the phone.”

  “Well, you know how he is. He didn’t share much with me. What was your impression?”

  “Corey seemed a little nervous about being arrested, and damn pissed off at Wylie. But to be straight up with you, I think he’s wrong for it. Gut feeling, but I’ve known him for a long time.”

  “Yeah, me too, but I never really got close with the guy. You probably know him better since y’all were in the same class.”

  “Could be. Anyway, he said that he was more than ready to have his truck and home searched and I told Wylie—”

  “That’s where he is as we speak,” Garza cut in. “First thing he did—just a couple of hours ago—was compare the tire prints to Corey’s truck. If you can believe it, Corey had four different brands of tires on that old heap. And one of them looked like a pretty good match. So then Wylie started going though the house, looking through all of Corey’s work boots and hunting boots. He found a pair of Red Wings on the back porch, covered with mud. I hate to say it, but those look like a match, too.”

  “That’s a pretty common brand of boot.”

  “That’s true,” Garza conceded. “Anyway, we’ll know more when we get the results back from DPS.” The Texas Department of Public Safety performed most of the forensic testing and analysis for smaller law-enforcement agencies throughout the state. Garza said, “We sent the tire, the boots, and the plaster casts down there. Asked ’em to put a rush on it, but we’ll see about that. Those guys are up to their eyeballs around the clock nowadays.”

  “What about a DNA test? That would be the clincher.”

  “Yeah, I almost forgot. He went for that, too. We took some blood and a buccal swab and sent it all to the lab. I imagine that’ll take a couple weeks. By the way, if I haven’t said it already: Thanks for talking to Corey. He sure got a lot more cooperative when you were done with him.”

  Marlin looked through the kitchen window at a passing bluejay. “It must be my charming personality. Plus the fact that I didn’t hit him with a nightstick.”

  “Ouch,” Garza said. “Low blow, and Wylie isn’t even here to defend himself.”

  “Which brings up another thing,” Marlin said. “How come Wylie didn’t just ask Corey for permission to search?”

  “Judgment call. He didn’t want to make Corey jittery, give him a chance to destroy evidence. Hey, he had a hard enough time just asking you to talk to Corey. You know how pr
oud he can be sometimes.”

  “Pigheaded is more like it.”

  Garza chuckled. “And that’s what makes him such a good cop. If nothing else, give him that. But we’re getting off-topic, aren’t we?”

  “All I’m saying is that he’s always the last to admit when he’s wrong. So if Corey comes back clean, you know I’m gonna have to ride him a little about it.”

  “Yeah, yeah. But right now, that’s looking like a pretty big ‘if.’” He lightened his tone. “You know, I’m glad we had this little chat, John. You’ve got a sharp mind, even for a redneck. You sure you don’t want to come work with me at the sheriff’s office?” Garza had asked Marlin that question several times in the last year.

  “I prefer hanging around with animals,” Marlin deadpanned. “They’re much nicer than people.”

  “This is insane, you know that?” T.J. asked, killing the engine on his boat. Darkness was settling over the water now, the surface of the lake as smooth as glass. “You know how deep this water is? And besides—you’ve never even scuba dived.”

  “How hard can it be to find a fuckin’ car?” Vinnie replied as he pulled on the wetsuit.

  T.J. took a hit from his ever-present joint. “Speaking of cars, I hear there’s catfish as big as Volkswagens down there. Swallow you whole. Better watch your ass.”

  “Just shut the fuck up, will ya? I don’t need you psychin’ me out with that shit.”

  Vinnie was feeling a little nervous, on edge, his guts tumbling around inside him. He had never scuba dived before. But when he had stolen the gear from the scuba shop—a little mom-and-pop operation up by Lake Buchanan—he had found a brochure with a checklist for scuba beginners. It said something about remembering to breath normally, especially on your way back up. And you were supposed to come up slower than your slowest bubble. Sounded pretty easy.

  “Gimme the rope.”

  T.J. handed him the end of a hundred-foot line, which Vinnie cinched around his waist.

  Vinnie said, “Keep it tight, but don’t yank on it, for chrissakes. Might be the only way I’ll know which way is up.”

  “Gotcha.”

  Vinnie pulled the scuba mask on and adjusted it for comfort. A few seconds later, he tugged his flippers on, gave T.J. a thumbs-up, and dropped backward off the boat into the cold water.

  Marlin slipped through the side door of the gymnasium just as Inga Mueller was taking the microphone, standing on a small stage underneath one of the basketball goals. There was a much larger crowd than Marlin had expected—probably close to three hundred.

  “Ladies and gentleman, I want to thank you for coming tonight.” Marlin spotted Phil Colby waving at him from the lower row of bleachers and took a seat next to him.

  “Howdy, stranger,” Marlin said.

  “I figured you’d show up,” Colby replied. “She’s just getting started.”

  Marlin turned his attention to the stage. Inga was wearing a short black skirt, low-heeled boots, and a clingy gray turtleneck. Man, if her goal is to get attention, she’ll definitely succeed, Marlin thought. It was like dropping a supermodel into the middle of a PTA meeting.

  Inga strolled slowly around the stage as she spoke into the handheld microphone. “I would like to talk to all of you tonight about a sensitive topic, one that requires serious thought from every citizen in Blanco County. Now, I know that many of you don’t know me, and that’s because”—she slipped into a Texas accent for a moment—“I’m not from ’round these parts.”

  Mild laughter rippled through the audience.

  “I wish I was, though, because Texas looks like a beautiful place to live. The people are so friendly, and proud, too. I met a man yesterday who showed me a picture of his new baby. He told me the baby weighed ten pounds, but he used to weigh twenty. I asked him what happened, and the man said he had him circumcised.”

  Marlin smiled. He hadn’t even seen that joke coming. For a brief moment, the crowd was silent, maybe a little startled, as if everyone was taking a moment, waiting to see if it was okay to laugh at such an off-color joke. Like: Did she really just say that? Then the chuckles began and rolled quickly through the crowd. Some guy yelled “Everything’s bigger in Texas, honey!”—which produced another round of laughter.

  “That’s what I’ve heard,” Inga replied with a coy smile, letting the laughter slowly fade away. “And I can see that when you do something around here, you do it in a big way. Like all the cedar-clearing that’s taking place in Blanco County...which is what we’re here to talk about tonight. The cedar tree, and its effect on the water supply…among other things.”

  Inga knelt at the front of the stage and flipped the switch on a slide projector. A large square of light appeared on the wall behind her.

  She pulled a device from her skirt pocket and punched a button. “This,” she said melodramatically, “is the evil cedar tree.”

  A scrubby Ashe juniper—commonly called a cedar in Texas—appeared on the screen. Inga playfully gave the tree a thumbs-down sign and hissed loudly. The audience chuckled, and many members joined in with a chorus of boos.

  Marlin shook his head and smiled. Yesterday, he’d figured Inga would offend the audience—either by not being very tactful or simply by being an outsider. But now she had them in the palm of her hand. Clever gal.

  “Now we all know what a pain in the, uh, derriere these things can be. They choke out all the hardwood trees, ruin your pastures, and hog all the water. I’ve read that an average-sized cedar uses about thirty-five gallons of water a day. And that seems to be the biggest complaint around here.”

  For the next ten minutes, Inga went on to discuss the water shortage in Blanco County, and the continuously low level of the aquifer. Marlin thought she was doing a great job; she obviously had a knack for keeping the interest of large groups, and her looks certainly didn’t hurt.

  As Inga continued, Marlin glanced around and saw a mixed crowd of people he knew: rural residents and city dwellers, schoolteachers and day laborers, Realtors and ranchers, young and old alike. Everyone appeared to be listening intently.

  “... so I understand the need for brush-clearing,” Inga was saying. “I mean, protecting the aquifer just seems like a smart move. But I wanted to talk to you about the impact the brush removal is having on the wildlife in the area.”

  She turned toward the screen as she punched a button. A rather unattractive black bird appeared on the screen.

  “Can anyone tell me what this is?” she asked the audience.

  Someone shouted that it was a crow. Someone else said a raven.

  “Not quite.” She flipped to the next photo. The same bird, but photographed from behind. Now you could see a faint ruby-colored half-band on the back of its neck. “Does that help?”

  In the front row, a young girl—probably a student, Marlin guessed—said, “Red-necked sapsucker?”

  “Exactly right!” Inga said. “Take a good look, because it may be the only time you’ll ever see one. These birds used to be found throughout the Southwest, but now they are found mostly in Central Texas, especially in Blanco County, and they are extremely rare. Nobody knows exactly how many are left, but the latest studies show there could be as few as just a couple hundred. Even more of a problem, the last dozen or so sightings have all been females. For whatever reason, the male population seems to be dwindling more rapidly than the females. Right now, biologists are hoping to locate and trap a male so they can try to breed the birds in captivity. So far, no luck. See, the females don’t need a male in order to lay eggs. But they do need a male to lay a fertilized egg—that is, one that can hatch a young bird. The women in the audience might say that’s all the males are good for.”

  Once again, the audience chuckled.

  “But here’s the biggest problem the red-necked sapsucker is facing: Unlike most birds, they are extremely picky when it comes to the materials they use for building nests. In fact, they chiefly use the long, stringy bark from cedar trees. It’s one of t
hose unfortunate cases when nothing else will do. They have to have cedar bark or they can’t make nests, they can’t produce offspring, and the species will gradually fade away. In other words, without plenty of cedar trees around, the red-necked sapsucker will become extinct—it’s that simple.”

  Marlin thought: Here’s where the audience either sides with her or against her.

  “My question is,” Inga said, “is it worth it? Is the water situation serious enough to justify wiping out an entire species? I’d like to make this a group discussion, so would anyone care to comment?”