by Vickie Fee
“I’m going to try to get her to go home.”
“Good luck with that,” I said.
With a look of resignation, he put his mom’s purse on a recliner, and we sat on the sofa next to it.
“Di’s on her way over,” I said.
“Why don’t you get her to run you home? You can drive my truck tomorrow, and I’ll have the car here if we need it.”
“I’ll stay. I hate leaving you here alone with your mom. What if something happens?”
Larry Joe and my mother-in-law both insisted I go home. So after Di and I had hugged them both and admonished them to get some rest, we headed to the parking lot.
“I don’t know why I’m leaving,” I said. “I know I won’t be able to sleep a wink tonight.”
“Where’s Duane’s diary?”
“In my car.”
“Good. Ray Franklin pulled out of the trailer park just ahead of me. So, if you’re feeling up to it, let’s grab the freaking diary and stick it back in the freezer for Dave to find.”
“Why not? No time like the present,” I said.
I retrieved the diary, which I’d stashed under the seat of our SUV, in the emergency room parking lot.
Chapter 16
Di retrieved the spare house key from inside the cement block, and we entered Ray’s camper the same way as before. Without the forethought to bring a flashlight, we made do with the little penlight on my key chain. Since we’d been there before, I figured that would provide enough light to find the freezer and replace the diary.
I froze for a moment when I thought I heard the scurrying of tiny paws. “I’m sure that’s just a cat under the camper,” I said out loud, refusing to entertain the possibility that I was stumbling around a dark room with a mouse.
I found that the book we had slipped into the empty frozen dinner carton was still in its place, and I felt relieved that Ray apparently hadn’t noticed the diary was missing. I pulled out the book, placed the diary in the carton, closed the freezer door, and turned around just as the camper door was flung open and a huge flashlight beam smacked me in the face. Di and I both stood silent and stunned, like deer in headlights, fearing what Ray’s next move might be.
Then a familiar voice spoke from behind the blinding light. “Just what in the hell do you two think you’re up to?”
“Oh, Dave. Thank God it’s you,” Di said as we both heaved a sigh of relief.
The sense of relief was premature. Dave let us know he was in no mood to be lenient.
“Step outside, ladies,” he said, motioning with the flashlight. We followed his instructions.
“I saw your car parked out here, and I was worried something might have happened to you,” Dave said, a slight tremor in his usually rock-solid voice. “Only to find out you and Liv McKay are just doing a little breaking and entering.”
“We didn’t break in. We used a key,” I said hopefully. Di held up the key as proof.
“So, you have the key to Ray’s trailer. Well, I’ll just call him and get this whole mess straightened out.”
Dave took his cell phone out of his pocket, and Di and I said, “No” in unison.
“Wait, Dave. We can explain everything if you just give us a chance,” Di said in a sweet-as-molasses voice. “Let’s all go back to my place and talk about this over a cup of coffee.”
Dave took a deep breath, and I could see his nostrils were flaring. In my experience, it’s never a good sign when a man’s nostrils flare.
“We’re going to talk, all right. Down at the station.”
“Dave, you can’t be seri—” Di began, but Dave interrupted.
“Damn skippy, I’m serious. Diane Souther, you get in your car and drive straight to the station.” He shifted his icy gaze in my direction. “And, you, get in the police car with me. I don’t want y’all cooking up a story on the drive over.”
We both stood there for a moment with a hangdog look on our faces, but Dave wasn’t about to give us a break.
“Move it,” he said.
And we did.
Terry, the dispatcher, watched quietly as Dave marched us through the station and into what I presumed was called the interrogation room.
“Terry, I don’t want to be disturbed for anything short of a homicide.”
Terry said, “Yes, sir.” And that was the last voice, other than mine and Di’s and Dave’s, I heard for the next three hours.
There was obviously more going on between Dave and Di than the situation at hand. My best guess, based on their current behavior and my own assumptions about their clandestine relationship, was Dave felt betrayed that Di hadn’t confided in him about our snooping. And Di, rankled that Dave was giving her such a hard time, was dropping the temperature in the room with her cold shoulder and frosty stares in Dave’s direction.
Unfortunately, this prompted Dave to shift his attention toward me. I managed to remain guarded in my answers for a while, telling Dave about the diary, since he had caught us red-handed. I tried to avoid telling him about other activities, like stalking Ray and stealing the security tapes from the trucking company. But as I felt the long arm of the law reaching across the table and putting me into a psychological choke hold, I finally caved. I ended up confessing everything I’d ever done that was wrong, all the way back to stealing a T-shirt from Carol Gompers while we were at church camp in the sixth grade.
I sat limp and spineless in my chair. Dave, apparently moved to compassion, asked Terry to bring us some coffee and doughnuts. Di turned up her nose at the stale doughnuts, but I was devoid of pride at that point.
Satisfied I had told him everything we’d been up to, Dave finally relaxed, at least momentarily, and assumed a friendly demeanor.
“Since I saw for myself that you didn’t remove anything from Ray’s camper, and you did have a key, I suppose we can forget about that, for now. And seeing how you ladies have provided information that may prove to be helpful—although you should have come to me with it sooner—I’ll keep you in the loop on the investigation to the extent that I can, which hopefully will encourage you not to do any more snooping around on your own.
“Rudy, the one you saw having a scuffle with Darrell on the tape, is a person of interest. The Feds have him under surveillance. Their people took apart that truck in Oklahoma and discovered a hidden compartment for drug smuggling. It was smartly done. Basically, the power drive had been fixed to transfer all the drive power to the front-drive axle. The rear axle continued to turn like normal, but the junction box and rear axle liner were used to hide drugs—in this case, about half a million dollars’ worth of heroin. Took a skilled mechanic to fix it up, so I’m thinking it was Darrell, and maybe Rudy, too.”
Dave adjured us not to tell anyone, including Larry Joe, about the hidden compartment just yet. “In addition to keeping their eyes on Rudy, the Feds are following other trucks and checking for hidden compartments as they can. Hopefully, this trail will lead to the drug trafficking ring that’s been operating through Dixie.”
Dave was intrigued by the diary’s implication that Ray Franklin could be Duane and Darrell’s father. “Based on what you’ve told me, I’m going to bring Ray in for questioning tomorrow about some possibly stolen Confederate artifacts. But what I really want is to get him to drink a Coke or some coffee so we can retrieve a DNA sample for the lab. If he is a deserter, I’ll gladly lock him up and hold him for the military police,” Dave said.
“Now, I’ve got a couple of things to wrap up here, but I will arrive at my house in exactly thirty minutes,” he said, his face suddenly stony and his nostrils flaring. It’s creepy the way he can turn his bad cop look off and on as if with the flip of a switch. “When I do, I’d better find a box of videotapes that have a bearing on a certain murder investigation left on my front porch anonymously, which I’m obligated to share with the FBI. If I don’t find said package when I get home, I know two people who will be arrested and charged with obstruction of justice before sunrise. Are we clear?�
�
I nodded vigorously.
Di just looked at me and said, “Let’s go.”
I felt as pale as the moonlight, but I savored breathing unrestricted air again as Di and I walked out of the station and got in her car.
“I can’t believe Dave was being such a jerk,” Di said, slamming the car door. “He knew good and well we weren’t stealing anything from Ray’s.”
“Yeah, but he also knew we were poking around in a murder investigation.”
Di appeared to have nothing else to say on the matter, so I dropped it.
“I guess it’s just as well I wasn’t planning to sleep tonight, since it’s almost a quarter to three,” I said. “Di, maybe you should call one of your bunco buddies and get them to sub for you today.”
“I’m not that old and decrepit yet. I’ll just get to bed early tonight . . . or tomorrow night. I don’t even know what night it is anymore.”
Di pulled into my driveway.
“You go on home,” I said. “I’ll drive Larry Joe’s truck to take care of that little errand for the sheriff.”
Chapter 17
After I got back from dropping off the tapes at Dave’s house, I checked the answering machine and double-checked my cell phone for texts or missed calls but found none. I figured no news from the hospital was good news.
Despite my concerns about insomnia, sleep came easily. Feeling as wrung out as a dishrag, I collapsed into bed and didn’t awaken until the alarm clock went off at 6:15 a.m.
I arrived in the ICU waiting room a few minutes before seven to find my husband and my mother-in-law looking haggard and swilling coffee out of Styrofoam cups. While they both looked tired, Miss Betty’s eyes were red, as if she’d been crying. When she excused herself to go to the ladies’ room, I asked Larry Joe about her.
“Did your mama not get any sleep?”
“Off and on. Actually, she did pretty well until about five o’clock. Mr. Coburn, one of the ICU patients, passed away. And that’s when they told his family. Mama got all emotional then.”
“I’m so sorry, honey. Maybe we can get your mom to go home and rest awhile after the eight o’clock visit.”
But rest would have to wait.
Dr. Chase came to talk to us just after we had gone in to see Daddy Wayne.
“Betty,” he said, “I don’t like the looks of this morning’s readings. I’m scheduling Wayne for angioplasty at ten this morning, and we’ll put in two stents while we’re in there.”
Despite Dr. Chase’s assurances that angioplasty was a very safe and widely used procedure, when we went in to see my father-in-law before they took him up for surgery Larry Joe and I squeezed his dad’s hands, as if we were seeing him for the last time. Then we slipped out to let my mother-in-law have a few minutes alone with him before his surgery.
My husband and I wrapped our arms around each other and stood silently in the hall until his mom came out of the room.
“I guess we should make some phone calls,” she said. “I’ll call the preacher and your uncle Ed.”
We spread out, leaving a few feet between each other, and Miss Betty made her calls, Larry Joe phoned the trucking company, and I called my mother. Mama was miffed that I hadn’t called her last night, but she softened when I told her Daddy Wayne was scheduled for stents at ten o’clock.
“I’m on my way,” she said.
My mom muscled her way in to see Daddy Wayne, even though it wasn’t visiting hours. Then she came out and sat with us in the waiting room. The three of us McKays were too tired to talk, so Mama carried the conversation—something she has a gift for. In a bit, Mama jumped up and said she was going to phone to see what was keeping the preacher.
Larry Joe took his mom’s hand and asked if she wanted us to call any of her friends.
“No. I’ve got my family here,” she said, holding tight to Larry Joe’s hand and reaching over to pat me on the knee. “Brother Caleb will put Wayne’s name on the prayer list for the Wednesday night service. By the end of the week, church folks will be swarming.”
“Maybe Daddy Wayne will be home by then,” I said, trying hard to sound hopeful.
A hush fell over the room, and all eyes turned as Mama walked through the door, accompanied by Brother Caleb Duncan in a three-piece suit, with slicked-back hair, and with a Bible tucked under one arm.
The three of us stood in unison. Brother Duncan clasped Miss Betty’s hands between his and assured her of the church’s prayers and support. He invited us to go with him to pray over Daddy Wayne. Larry Joe and his mom followed along behind Brother Duncan, and Mama and I decided to remain in the waiting room.
“Did y’all go out to the graveside service yesterday?” Mama asked.
“No. We talked Daddy Wayne into going home to lie down, which should have been a sign. I wish we had made him go on to the hospital right then. Maybe he could have avoided having this heart attack.”
“Now, you know dang well you couldn’t have dragged that bullheaded man to the hospital. I’m surprised you were able to talk him into going home to lie down. Hopefully, after this wake-up call he’ll take better care of himself. Betty’s just going to have to put her foot down if he won’t behave. And speaking of misbehaving, I had to put my foot down with a certain make-believe colonel yesterday,” Mama said, barely taking a breath.
She went on. “Junior Price grabbed my bottom during the funeral lunch, as I was pouring iced tea in his glass. Sitting there, all decked out in his Confederate uniform . . . He may be an officer, but he’s certainly no gentleman. I gave him my best squinty-eyed look. If Junior had put his hand on my fanny a second time, he was getting cooled off with a pitcher of iced tea to his crotch.”
In the South, a man can still be called “Junior” decades after the “Senior” is dead and buried. I guessed Junior Price to be in his midseventies. However, I know from experience that Mama’s mean, squinty-eyed look was pretty scary at any age.
“What were you doing at the funeral lunch? I thought the Methodist women were taking care of it.”
“Liv, you know me. I’m not the kind who waits around to be asked to do something. Sylvia and I just naturally pitched in. Besides, that little Methodist group obviously needed some help. Pitiful lack of planning there. Three different people brought potato salad, for heaven’s sake.”
I wouldn’t say Mama didn’t have good intentions, but in this case I tended to believe her motivation might have been more about gossip than gospel. I didn’t scold her, though. One, because it wouldn’t do any good, and two, because I wanted to hear whatever gossip she might have picked up.
“I’m glad Wayne went home to rest. Ralph Harvey was there, so McKay Trucking was represented, and Ralph seemed to know some of those Civil War actors. Wasn’t that the strangest thing you’ve ever seen, all the pallbearers in Confederate uniforms? But at least they were dressed nice. I’ve been to some funerals where the pallbearers didn’t even wear a tie. . . .”
Mama went on for a good while but didn’t tell me anything useful to the investigation. If Tonya Farrell had any family still living, they didn’t come to the funeral, which was sad.
“I happened to see Junior Price handing a thick envelope to Tonya Farrell,” Mama said. “I assumed the Civil War actors passed the hat and gave the money they collected to Tonya to help with funeral expenses, which I thought was real nice. Only time I saw that poor woman smile all day, bless her heart. It was almost sweet enough to make me forgive Junior Price for pinching my bottom—but not quite.”
It seemed like hours before they took my father-in-law to the operating room, and the hour and twenty minutes for the procedure seemed even longer. Afterward, Dr. Chase came into the waiting room, still dressed in scrubs. He said the procedure went well, but Daddy Wayne’s blood pressure was still too high. They’d have to monitor him closely, and he likely would be in the intensive care unit for a couple more days.
We all breathed a sigh of relief that Daddy Wayne had made it through sur
gery. Mama left after hearing the doctor’s report, and Larry Joe finally talked his mom into going home and they left to get a bite to eat and to get some rest. I volunteered to stay in the ICU waiting room until they returned. I knew my mother-in-law wouldn’t leave unless somebody was keeping vigil.
Di arrived to keep me company just after 7:00 p.m. with take-out plates from the diner.
“How was yoga class this evening?” I asked as I speared a green bean with a plastic fork.
“It was fine. And you’ll be pleased to know, against my better judgment, I did your bidding and invited Deputy Ted to join me for some ice cream after class. I guess your father-in-law being in the hospital made me feel charitable. Plus, I’m still not speaking to Dave.”
“Did you find out anything?”
“Yeah. I found out Ted’s a sloppy eater. But he also told me they scored with their surveillance operation the other night.”
I listened with rapt attention as Di laid out the details. The manager at the mini-storage place had called the sheriff after spotting some guy walking around outside of Darrell Farrell’s storage unit—the one with all the expensive Civil War gear in it—and taking a real close look at the lock. So Ted had set up surveillance that night to see if the guy would come back and try to break in, which he did. The sheriff had instructed Ted not to arrest the guy until he came out of the storage unit. Dave wanted to know what he was after. Thought it might be important to the case.
“Ted said it was pretty obvious the thief wasn’t a professional, since it took him, like, fifteen minutes to get the lock open,” Di said before downing the last of her bottled water and reaching across me to take a drink of my Diet Coke. “I guess that ice cream made me thirsty.”
