Hornswoggled - An Alafair Tucker Mystery

by Donis Casey

  “Good day to you, Alafair,” he greeted. “What can I do for you this fine day?”

  Alafair sat herself down in the bentwood chair beside the sheriff’s desk and came right to the point. “Scott, what can you tell me about the murder of Louise Kelley?” she asked.

  Scott sat down on the edge of the desk. “Louise has been singing in the choir celestial for most of a year now,” he noted. “Being as her earthly remains were discovered on your land, I’m surprised you haven’t asked me about this long before now.”

  “I didn’t know that Alice was interested in Walter Kelley before now.”

  “Ah,” Scott breathed, enlightened. He stood up. “Can I get you some coffee? No?” He moved around behind the desk and took his seat, then leaned forward on his elbows. “Here’s what I propose,” he said. “I’m going to tell you what I found out about that affair, little as it is, just to set your mind at ease about Walter Kelley, because as I see it, it’s most unlikely that he could have been involved in the murder of his wife. But before I do, I want you to promise that you won’t go off half cocked, like you did last year when Harley Day got hisself shot in the head. You remember how that turned out. You almost got your own head stove in.”

  “I learned my lesson, Scott,” she assured him grimly. “But if you can set my mind at ease about Walter, I would be much obliged.”

  Scott leaned back comfortably and gathered his thoughts for a moment. “Here’s the bare facts,” he began. “On July second last year, at about one-thirty in the afternoon, Walter left Muskogee on the train with a ticket for Kansas City, where his mother lives. He had told some of his customers that he was planning to get home late on the morning of the sixth, but according to his mother, Walter’s uncle made a special trip up from Joplin on the day before, just to see his nephew. So Walter decided to stay, and changed his return ticket to July 10. Instead, I wired him that his wife was dead, and he ended up coming home late on the seventh.

  “After Miz Kelley got murdered and her husband came home, I sent my deputy, Trent, on the same trip Walter took. I told him to talk to everybody he could find from here to Kansas City who may have seen or spoken to Walter. Walter was the only person to board the Wichita train in Muskogee that day. He makes that trip regular, and him being such a friendly fellow, they know him well at the Muskogee depot. The conductor remembers him, and so do two or three people at the station who saw him get on. Likewise, witnesses saw him change trains in Wichita for Kansas City, and we have plenty of witnesses who can testify that he got to Kansas City on time, went to his mother’s home, and was seen there and around the neighborhood every day after that for a week. There ain’t two hours together that he was in Kansas City that he can’t account for—certainly not enough time for him to get back to Boynton and kill his wife without anybody in Kansas City noticing he was gone.”

  “How do you know that he didn’t hire somebody to do the deed while he was well away?” Alafair asked. “It was common knowledge that him and Louise weren’t happy together.”

  “It’s possible, Alafair,” Scott admitted. “But if he did, I can’t find one single bit of evidence of it. No money went missing from his bank account, nor was he seen consorting with known thugs and wastrels. The Kelleys weren’t happy, that’s true. Plenty of people were quick to point that out when I went to asking questions. But nobody could say for sure that there was ever any violence or even loud words in that marriage. Discontentment ain’t enough reason to indict a man for murder.

  “On the other hand, there was lots of evidence that Louise had been leading a shadow life of her own for some time. And it seems that when Walter went to Kansas City, Louise cut loose. The last time I can prove that anybody saw her alive was the fifth of July, the night before the boys found her in the creek. She had been dancing that evening at the Rusty Horseshoe roadhouse outside of town, sneaking out and drinking home brew behind the building with a young man. Got herself falling down drunk, the proprietor says, and made quite the fool of herself. Then several people tell me that she left the place a little after dark on the night of the fifth with the same fellow, who was as plastered as she was. And that was it. No one has seen hide nor hair of this man since. I did get a good description of him and the horse he rode in on. The law in three states is on the lookout for him. I expect he holed up a spell, but he’ll be feeling safe eventually, and may be out and about by now. Somebody will spot him sooner or later, and we can at least give the poor woman some justice, even if she didn’t have no happiness.”

  Alafair, who had been listening with a troubled expression on her face, pondered for a moment, then shook her head. “But what about Walter’s straying? I’m guessing you did talk to the Crockers.”

  Scott laughed. “Scandalous news does spread, don’t it?” he observed. “Yes, I looked into all that. Neither husband nor wife was faithful in the Kelley marriage, I’m afraid. Who knows who drove the other to it? Walter says they hadn’t been as man and wife for a couple of months or so before Louise’s unfortunate end. Now, Alafair, I think I can tell you fairly certain that Walter didn’t kill his wife, but I’m sad to say that I can’t tell you that Walter Kelley was much of a husband.”

  “I’m distressed to hear it.”

  “It may not have been his fault, you know, that unhappy marriage,” Scott ventured.

  “You’re a charitable man,” Alafair observed, with a sour smile.

  “I’ve always known you to give a person the benefit of the doubt.”

  “Not where my children’s welfare is concerned,” she assured him.

  Scott hid his amused expression by passing his hand casually over his face. “In any case,” he said, “whoever killed Louise was a pretty low character. She had a bruise on one side of her face, like she had been struck by a fist. Doc Addison said that she was stabbed with one furious blow that broke her breastbone and plunged right into her heart. It was an unusual knife, too—a big carving knife with a white bone handle that had a design of a ship whittled into it. Scrimshaw, they call it. She was dead before she hit the ground. And then the murderer—or murderers, I think, judging by the tracks—somehow toted her body, knife and all, from wherever it was they killed her down to Cane Creek, where they stuffed her under the cottonwood roots up nigh the bank. Probably not eight or ten hours before your boys found her.”

  Goose bumps rose on Alafair’s arms at the thought. “Mercy. I don’t like the thought of bad sorts like that being on the loose, and for so long.”

  “Sometimes it takes a while to catch them if they go into hiding. I doubt if they’re still close around here,” Scott soothed her. “But whether they are or they ain’t, we’ll get them soon enough.”

  “Do you have the names of these men?”

  “We know the name of the man who was seen at the roadhouse with Louise.”

  “Would I know him?”

  “I doubt it,” Scott assured her.

  Alafair nodded. Cousin Scott was the most easygoing of men in his daily life, but she had never known anyone more doggedly persistent in the pursuit of justice. “So you don’t think Louise was killed there on the banks of Cane Creek?”

  “I didn’t find no evidence of it. The ground around the creek bank was pretty churned up by the time I got there, but I did find prints going off away from the creek out toward y’all’s back forty. Looked to me like two people on horseback and one pony —or maybe a jenny or a jackass—with a triangle-shaped nick in the left rear shoe. I tracked them through the woods onto the Eichelburger property, cut right across the corner of their pasture, then I lost the trail on the road. They were heading away from town, I think. South.”

  “Well, Scott, they could be in Mexico by now, couldn’t they?”

  “They could be all the way to the South Pole by now, but I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?” Alafair persisted.

  “Now, Alafair,” Scott said, “you don’t expect me to give away all my secrets, do you?”

  She blinked at
him, disappointed. Of course, that was exactly what she was hoping for. But Scott had just informed her gently but firmly that if he had suspicions who these miscreants were and where they were hiding, he certainly wasn’t going to tell her.

  “If you know who they are, though, why haven’t you put up their pictures? Don’t you want folks to be on the lookout?”

  “Maybe we do have certain folks on the lookout. Maybe we don’t want the villains to know we’re hunting ’em, so they’ll feel comfortable enough to come out of hiding.”

  “Ah,” Alafair said, enlightened. “Local fellows, then.”

  “Local enough. Leave it to us lawmen, Alafair. I expect we know what we’re doing.”

  Scott smiled, and Alafair flushed. “I never thought otherwise,” she assured him. She stood up, and Scott did likewise. “Thank you for so kindly telling me all this, Scott,” she said. “I can’t say you exactly put my mind at ease, but at least I don’t feel so ignorant about the man Alice has her eye on.”

  “I’m glad I could be of help, such as it is,” Scott said. “You know, if Alice was my girl, I’d be concerned, too. Are you going to talk to Shaw about this?”

  “I surely am. I can’t imagine what he’ll say about it. He likes Walter Kelly a lot.”

  Scott sighed. “So do I,” he admitted.

  ***

  Alafair unhitched the horse from the rail in front of the sheriff’s office, but didn’t mount. Instead she took the reins and led the horse down the street. She felt like she needed time to think. As she walked down Main Street, absently greeting several acquaintances who were going about their business, she passed Elm, and on a whim, took a left turn and walked up the street, past Kelley’s white frame house.

  It was a nice neighborhood. The long, brick-paved street was lined with American elms, not yet massive trees, since the town of Boynton itself wasn’t very old, but big enough to cast a pleasant lace of shade over the sidewalk. A haze of pale green leaves gave the light that filtered through the branches a soothing pastel hue. Most of the houses were large, often two stories, and painted white, with red brick foundations that flowed all of a piece into long brick walks leading from the porches to the street. The Kelley house, sitting on the corner of Third and Elm, was smaller, only one story, with a gabled attic. But it was well appointed, with fancy gingerbreading along the porch and a leaded glass window panel in the front door.

  Grandma Sally’s big red gelding clopped placidly along with Alafair, his enormous head next to her shoulder, nodding along with each step as though he approved of her detour. An occasional snort of sweet, hot horse breath warmed the flesh of her arm.

  She began to talk to the horse under her breath as they ambled along, up and down Elm Street. “I don’t know what I think I’m going to see, here, Horse,” she murmured. “I reckon I ought to be getting on home, before your mistress takes exception to being left alone with a squally little mess of a baby.”

  Her gaze swept Kelley’s neat yard as she passed it for the second time. “Do I think Louise’s unquiet ghost is going to march right out here and tell me who killed her? You know what I’d say to her if I could, Horse? I’d say: ‘Louise, I’m sorry you got killed, and if I could find out who murdered you, I sure would. But, you know, what I really wonder is, what kind of a man is your former husband?’ That’s mighty bad of me, ain’t it, Horse?”

  She passed Kelley’s house a third time, sighed with annoyance at her own folly, and headed back toward Main Street. She was just walking by the neighbor’s gate, when the front door opened and two women came out of the house and walked down the steps toward the street. Alafair and the horse stopped abruptly.

  “Good afternoon,” she called, before she had thought what she would say to these people.

  The older woman paused, her hand on her front gate, and looked up at Alafair with a smile, not thinking it all odd that a stranger leading a horse down her street would greet her. “Afternoon,” she called back.

  The two women were obviously mother and daughter. Their round, red-cheeked faces and sturdy builds were exactly the same. If you subtracted twenty-five years and twenty-five pounds, the daughter was a perfect picture of what the mother must have looked like in her youth.

  “Fine day, ain’t it?” Alafair said, as she led the horse over to the sidewalk.

  “It surely is,” the woman agreed.

  “My name’s Alafair Tucker. My husband is Shaw Tucker, and our farm is just out west of town. His mama is Miz Peter McBride, you may know of them. Sheriff Scott Tucker is my husband’s cousin.”

  “Yes, indeed,” the woman responded. “I know of y’all’s place out there. My daughter here is friends with Maxine Cecil. I believe Maxine’s mother is your husband’s sister. My husband voted for Sheriff Tucker last time. He’s a good man.” Alafair wasn’t surprised that the woman was familiar with her family. It would be hard to swing a cat without hitting a Tucker here in Muskogee County.

  The woman extended her hand. “I’m Wanda Grant, and this here is my daughter Susan. My husband is the local representative for the Muskogee Tool Company.”

  “Hello,” Susan managed to wedge in.

  “Hello, Susan. Yes, Miz Grant, my husband has dealt with yours, I believe. Proud to meet you.”

  Now that they had properly placed themselves in the great scheme of local society, Alafair prepared to get down to business. She noted that the Grant women were both nicely dressed in fashionable high waisted cream-colored frocks and wing-brimmed hats. On their way out, either for shopping or calling, she figured. Alafair was going to have to get right to the point.

  “I was just visiting with Scott,” she said. “We was talking about the murder of your neighbor, Miz Kelley, last summer, and how nobody has been caught, yet. Got my curiosity up, I confess, and I just decided to wander past and have a look at the house. Pretty nosy, I guess. I reckon you must have known Miz Kelley, though! That was a sad story, wasn’t it, about some devil doing her in and dumping her in the creek?”

  Mrs. Grant pursed her lips and shook her head. “Well, I don’t like to malign the dead…” she began, in a way that told Alafair she was about to do just that. “…Nobody ought to get murdered like that, no matter what they’re up to, but I must say that I wasn’t surprised that Louise got herself in a bad situation and came to no good. Yes, we knew Miz Kelley pretty well, and a more unpleasant woman you’d never meet…”

  “Now, Mama,” Susan interjected, “Miz Kelley wasn’t so bad, just demanding. Her and Walter just wasn’t suited, I think, her being serious and him so sociable. She wished he was different than he was. Why, they probably never knew how to make each other happy.”

  Alafair looked at Susan with renewed interest. Because of her earlier silence, she had made a quick assumption that the daughter was retiring, but the girl was more spirited than she had first appeared.

  “Thank you, Susan,” Mrs. Grant was saying. “Yes, I shouldn’t be so hard on Louise, since things turned out the way they did.”

  “I heard there was some talk that her husband may have had something to do with it,” Alafair ventured.

  Both Mrs. Grant and Susan made indignant noises at that. “Why, I’d just fall right down dead from shock if Walter ever had a mean thought, much less killed his wife,” Mrs. Grant assured her. “He was a saint for putting up with her for as long as he did, is what I think.”

  “Now, Mama,” Susan chastised.

  Mrs. Grant gave her daughter an indulgent smile. “Susan has been listening to her father, I think. He don’t like us talking bad about Louise now she’s dead. My husband is a good Christian man, and tries not to pass judgment.” She turned to Susan. “But tell the truth, now, honey. You didn’t care much for Miz Kelley, either.”

  Susan shrugged. “Well, she wasn’t very nice to me, I admit. She’d give me a look that would wither a post every time I walked by.”

  Mrs. Grant leaned toward Alafair. “Jealous,” she said under her breath. “And her husband is the
nicest man, always with a good word to say to anybody.”

  “Wasn’t there some rumor a while back that Mr. Kelley had a dalliance?” Alafair asked.

  “Rumor, is all! I heard that, too. But I’ve been neighbor to the Kelleys for five years, Miz Tucker, and I just can’t credit it. In fact…” Mrs. Grant hesitated and bit her lip, wondering whether to spill a tidbit that was too scandalous even for her. She didn’t wonder for long. “In fact,” she continued, “it was the other way around. I know Louise was seen in the company of someone other than her husband the night she was killed, but I had the feeling for a long time before that that she had her a fellow somewhere.”

  “Mama,” Susan admonished.

  Mrs. Grant had the good manners to blush. “I know I’m being mean. But I like Walter Kelley a lot, and I’m sorry to hear there’s stories about him going around.”

  You must like Walter indeed, Alafair thought, to go on so readily about his late wife to someone whom you just met in the street. But she said, “I understand, Miz Grant.”

  “The Sheriff asked us a lot of questions in the weeks after the murder,” Mrs. Grant continued. “Why, he must have been over here half a dozen times. I could tell he suspected Walter might have had something to do with it, but you know, there wasn’t a bad thing we could say about Walter.” She sighed. “Poor man. He was all at odds after Louise died. We took food over to him every night after he got back from Kansas City, or he would have starved to death. After a week or so, I volunteered Susan to keep his house for him. She goes in to clean a couple times a week. I figured it might cheer him to be around a fine young woman for a while. You should have seen what a mess he let that house get into. Men are just helpless, I declare.”