by Deb Baker
“The house is fine,” I said. “Don’t you care at all about what’s happening to Little Donny?”
“What about Little Donny?” Grandma asked, her teeth snapping and her scrawny turkey neck craned in my direction. “Is he finally coming to visit? It’s about time. I haven’t seen him for over a year.”
“Never mind,” Heather said to her, patting Grandma’s wrinkled, liver-spotted hand. “Everything is going to be fine.”
“What are we having to eat?” Grandma asked, sitting herself down at the table and picking up her spoon.
“Canned soup,” I said. “Soup and crackers.”
“As long as it isn’t chicken.”
I ladled chicken noodle soup into her bowl and threw a package of saltine crackers into the center of the table.
How was I supposed to solve the warden’s murder and plan meals, too? I was running surveillance, almost getting myself killed on top of it, and I was supposed to put food on the table for two helpless, basket-case women. Heather had to pull herself together and help out or Grandma would show up at the stove again, expecting to cook, and end up poisoning us all.
“What happened over there?” I asked Heather.
Grandma slurped her soup. “What kind of soup is this?”
“Tuna,” I answered. “And let Heather talk.”
“That vicious dog of yours is back,” Grandma said. “Heather tied it up behind the house until the dogcatcher can come and haul it away.”
Heather shook her head at my questioning look. “George dropped Fred off right before you came home. He’s out back. I thought it was safest.”
“Will you please tell me what happened,” I repeated.
“The skinny deputy tried to kick in grandma’s door, but it didn’t work. Then the other one, the big wrestler-like one, smashed out a window and pushed his gun through and yelled that we were under arrest.”
“What was wrong with knocking on the door?”
“Blaze asked the same thing. It wasn’t locked and Little Donny wasn’t armed but they didn’t even check to see if it was open. They could have walked right in. But the skinny one got excited when his partner broke the window and he shot through the door, almost hitting me. Blaze is mad. He made them put plastic over the window and they have to pay to have everything repaired.”
“Dickey never had any brains,” I said.
“Dickey Snell?” Grandma piped up, hunched over her bowl of soup, the spoon halfway to her mouth. “Is that the same Dickey Snell who shot Blaze in the back with a pellet gun when they were young?”
“The same one,” I agreed.
“Never liked that kid,” she said.
“Blaze says his deputies are coming around first thing in the morning to take our fingerprints,” Heather said.
“Why would they do that?”
“Blaze and Deputy Snell think Little Donny has an accomplice and they’re trying to eliminate friendly prints. Blaze also said Little Donny’s car is missing.”
****
“Little Donny would still be safe at Grandma’s if I didn’t have such a big mouth,” I said to Cora Mae over the phone. “I never should have told his mother. What was I thinking?”
“It isn’t your fault,” Cora Mae said. “You did your best.”
I related my afternoon adventure playing war games at the Latvala camp and she gasped and clucked sympathetically during all the appropriate pauses.
“I keep thinking I’m missing something,” I said. “I can’t understand why anybody would need to commit murder over a bunch of birds or over a little night poaching. There’s more at stake here than we think. Call Kitty. Both of you need to pick me up first thing tomorrow. Latvala’s sending the next shipment, whatever that means. Let’s intercept it.”
“What about Walter? I thought you said he did it?”
“The problem is, we have too many suspects and we have to start eliminating them. It still certainly could be Walter. What did you find out at the game?”
“Not much. The Lions won but it was close. In the last thirty seconds…”
“Not the game, Cora Mae. You were supposed to interrogate the Smith brothers and keep an eye on Walter.”
“BB repeated the story about the warden catching them shining, but he didn’t say anything new.”
“I was hoping for a more detailed description.”
“Other than the warden’s foreign accent, he…”
“What foreign accent?” I interrupted.
“BB thought he might be from down south, Arkansas or Georgia. Maybe from Denmark or New Jersey.”
“Cora Mae,” I said, disgusted. “Which is it? None of those accents are remotely similar.”
I didn’t know what a Dane sounded like, but I was pretty sure I wouldn’t confuse the accent with a Georgian’s or a New Joiseyen’s.
“That’s what he said. I’m just repeating it.”
“Was he drinking?”
“Not a drop. Well, maybe one. Has George been around?”
“He went on vacation,” I lied. “You better concentrate your efforts on BB.”
“When will George be back?”
“Just get over here first thing tomorrow before Dickey shows up with his fingerprinting kit.”
****
The capture of the local sheriff’s alleged serial-killer nephew sent every resident in three counties charging over for a look. It also revved up both the Escanaba and the Marquette news media, and they raced from opposite ends of the U.P. for exclusive live coverage. The news vans hovered around Ray’s General Store like one giant collective buzzard hunting for scraps of Little Donny’s flesh. Meanwhile, Blaze’s deputies held off potential trouble with a visible array of police batons and a lot of verbal threats.
It was ten at night before I arrived at the jail, but the glow of the media’s lighting systems illuminated the moonless sky for miles in every direction, reminding me of how the sky looks in a big city.
I parked Little Donny’s newly painted Ford Escort down near the four-way stop and walked up the road with Fred on a leash. Blaze came out of his office as I arrived. When all the camera lights swung in his direction, I assumed this was the first action the media had seen.
“This isn’t going to turn into a free-for-all,” I heard Blaze shout, although I couldn’t see him. The mass of bodies with cameras and notebooks drew together tighter. I surveyed the crowd and noticed that Blaze had deputized more of the local residents than usual, and they were taking their new positions seriously.
Someone was bound to get shot before the end of the night.
“Now,” his voice continued. “Deputy Snell is here to take questions and then I want you all to go home. This is my town and I won’t have it overrun like this. Deputy Snell?”
Dickey leaped up in the bed of a pickup truck so everyone could see him. He held both arms high over his head like he was the president of the United States greeting his constituents from the steps of Air Force One. “As you know, we apprehended the alleged suspect at seventeen hundred hours at an undisclosed location. It quickly became a dangerous hostage situation.”
I shook my head. From my understanding, the only thing dangerous about the apprehension was Deputy Dickey.
“I’m going to give you some information,” he said, “but I won’t be answering questions, so listen up. And you reporters, write fast because I’m not repeating myself.” He cleared his throat importantly. “I and Deputy Sheedlo cornered the suspect in his hideout. A fight ensued, we managed to subdue the alleged party in question, and he’s incarcerated here temporarily. The hostage was unharmed. The prisoner will be moved to a more secure facility tomorrow so you can all rest easy later. But for tonight, keep your firearms handy.”
Thanks to Fred’s ability to scare people, I had worked my way closer.
Blaze, looking like he’d swallowed tacks, rushed over and displaced Dickey. “That’s enough. Thank you for the colorful rendition, Deputy Snell, but everyone can forget the need for w
eapons. The suspect turned himself in willingly and no force was even close to necessary. There was no hostage taken. We’ll have guards stationed but we aren’t expecting any trouble.”
The reporters, who had been scribbling madly while Dickey told his story, didn’t take a single note of Blaze’s attempt at rectifying the tall tale.
I could see tomorrow’s headlines already. Relative of Local Sheriff Runs Amok and Is Taken Down Like Rabid Dog.
Anybody who wasn’t here tonight would think the story was about me.
Blaze stormed into his office, and the deputies tried to restore order. I crept around the back of the crowd with Fred leashed at my side. Surprisingly, my companion was walking like he’d been trained to heel instead of ripping out my arm socket as he usually did.
It was a good thing George and Carl moved my truck from behind the junk heap before the commotion started or I’d have a lot of extra explaining to do. Speaking of…
“Carl,” I called to a familiar figure ahead of me. He turned around and I saw the shining badge. “What’s up?”
“Blaze deputized me,” he said, proudly.
“Does he know you helped Little Donny hide?”
“Holy smokes, Gertie, keep your voice down.”
“Sorry.” I swung my gaze around to see if anyone had overheard. “Thanks for moving my truck,” I said, softer.
“You’re going to get me in all kinds of trouble before this is over. I shouldn’t have helped George with your truck.”
Carl sounded like Grandma Johnson.
“You’re doing a fine job of finding trouble without my input,” I reminded him.
“I tell ya, I don’t know if I’ll ever hunt again.” Carl’s eyes shifted to study the crowd. “For sure I’m not going back to my bait pile. I keep seein’ all that blood in my mind.”
“You’ll be just fine.”
“Are you going to snitch on me for helping Little Donny?”
“I tell you what. You get me through this mob and into the jail, and your secret goes to the grave with me.”
“Deal,” Carl said, shifting his eyes up and down and sideways. “But Blaze won’t like it.”
****
“I want to be deputized,” I said to Blaze, who sat at his desk with his feet crossed over a stack of jumbled papers.
Fred, standing level with the desk, slid his big, black head next to Blaze’s shoes and sniffed.
“I don’t know how you got in here,” he said, eyeing the entrance. Carl had taken off like a jackrabbit heading for his hole with a coyote after him. “But you need to go back home.”
“Hi Little Donny,” I called out to a massive body lying on a cot inside the cell.
“He’s sleeping,” Blaze said, swinging his feet down. “How he can sleep with all the excitement outside is beyond me.” He flipped his sheriff’s hat onto the desk and rubbed his face roughly with both hands as though he was erasing a bad dream.
“He’s innocent, you know,” I said. “All he’s guilty of is eating day-old bakery and sleeping in the woods.”
“I’d like to believe that, but he won’t talk to me. He zipped up his lip and the only thing he’s asked for is food.”
Good for Heather and her city-smart fancy husband, Big Donny. She must have told him to clam up until they could get a lawyer in to see him.
“You’re keeping him here, I hope,” I said. “Near his family until this is cleared up.”
Blaze shook his head. “He’s headed for Escanaba tomorrow where they have a real jail and more security.”
“He isn’t a flight risk.”
Blaze glanced at me. “He’s been running all along.”
Good point. Hard to argue against firm facts.
“But,” Blaze said, “I’m doing it for his own protection. Billy Lundberg might have been the town drunk, but his family goes way back and people are riled up.”
A deputy came in and saluted. “Most everybody has gone home,” he reported. “Even the news trucks are packing up for the night. What should we do now?”
“Tell the deputies we need two guards around the clock,” Blaze said. “The rest are on call in case I need them.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“They all think they’re United States Marines,” Blaze complained when the deputy marched out. “Saluting and aye, aying.”
“Well?” I said.
“Well, what?”
“Am I a deputy?”
“No, Ma, you’re not.”
I pointed in the general direction of the street and I felt my face getting hot. “Onni Maki’s out there flashing a badge through all those gold chains around his neck. If he can do a deputy’s job, anybody can.”
“Onni really is an ex-Marine.”
“If Billy Lundberg wasn’t dead you’d deputize him. You’d rather have a drunk than your own mother.”
“That isn’t true.”
“I didn’t see one woman deputy. How do you explain that? This is sexual discrimination.”
Blaze stared at me. “You’re exaggerating, as usual. I’m not deputizing you because you’d think that was your signal to run totally wild. You don’t have much restraint as it is.”
“What’s that supposed to mean,” I demanded, hands on hips.
Fred sat down with a plunk as our tones shifted, and his ears flattened against his head. Obviously he didn’t like conflict any more than I did.
“Go home, Ma.”
“A warden riding an ATV caught Walter’s hunting guests shining bear.”
“So? Out-of-towners get caught breaking the law all the time.”
“It happened the same morning Hendricks was killed, and Walter has stinging nettle welts on his arms just like Little Donny. He could have killed the warden for threatening to arrest the Detroit boys. Or one of those boys could have eliminated Hendricks.”
“Assuming your theory is right, which it isn’t, how do you explain the arrows in Billy’s back?”
“Mistaken identity. Billy Lundberg was killed because he was wearing Little Donny’s cap. My grandson saw the murderer.”
“Well, he’s safe in here,” Blaze said, dismissing me with a wave. “Maybe tomorrow Little Donny will open up and tell me his side of the story.”
“I’m warning you,” I said, with a menacing glare. “Nothing better happen to Little Donny. I’m holding you solely responsible for his safety.”
“Nothing’s going to happen to him.”
“Someone in Maple County is dealing in illegal birds. Don’t you want to know about that?”
Blaze stood up slowly and towered over me while he attempted to hitch his pants over his protruding stomach. He puffed his chest out and a button zinged past.
Blaze’s intimidation tactics never worked on me. I poked him hard in his extended midsection. He let out a puff of air and his brashness deflated significantly.
“Little Donny didn’t do it,” I said.
“Prove it,” Blaze said, sounding like a child.
That’s exactly what I planned on doing. I’d exonerate Little Donny and drag the real killer in by his shorts. Or rather, Fred, the private eye dog, could handle the back-end work.
Tomorrow I’d pin on my new sheriff’s badge and turn this town upside-down until I found the truth and the real killer.
Deputized by the local sheriff or not.
chapter 18
Dickey and No-Neck banged on the door before the sun crested the top of the pines. I still wore my robe and hadn’t poured my first cup of coffee yet.
A roving band of guinea hens pecked at their ankles as I peered out the window, reaffirming my birds’ ability to sift through the dirt and find the biggest insects.
No-Neck had a big box under his arm.
I opened the door just enough for Fred to stick his head out. I considered siccing Fred on them to assist the hens, but after sniffing his former law-enforcement colleagues, Fred plunked down and concentrated on licking his paws.
“Ow,” Dickey said, ra
ising a leg. “Let us in. What’s wrong with these birds?”
I wanted to say that they knew fools when they encountered them. Instead I said, “You can’t come in. Tell Blaze that.”
“He authorized us to use reasonable force, if necessary,” Dickey said, with a militant gleam in his eyes. “He warned us about you. We know you’re hostile to law enforcement and to rules and regulations.”
“What’s going on?” Grandma Johnson mumbled from behind me. She didn’t have her teeth in yet and it wasn’t a pretty sight.
“Blaze’s deputies want to fingerprint all members of our family,” I said.
“Over my dead body,” Grandma said. “You young puddle-jumpers aren’t telling me what to do.” She waved a scrawny finger at the deputies.
“We don’t need your prints, ma’am,” Dickey explained. “Blaze said you haven’t vacated the premises for weeks so yours aren’t required.”
“Well, that’s different. Come on in,” Grandma said. “I suppose you’re after Gertie.” She gave me the evil eye. “Figures she’d be involved in something bad.”
I didn’t know what to do. If I let them take my fingerprints and Blaze discovered that I’d been driving Little Donny’s car, he might arrest me just to keep me out of the way. That’s one man who hates professional competition and will do anything to quell it, even if it means jailing his own mother.
If I refused, these two clowns would be on my tail all day and I wouldn’t be able to work the case.
Then I had an idea. An old idea but newly remembered.
“What are you waiting for?” I said, backing up into Grandma. “Let’s get this over with. The coffee’s almost ready by now.”
Everyone stepped gingerly around Fred.
No-Neck placed his box on the table, opened it, and started sifting through the equipment while I set a heaping plate of homemade sugar doughnuts on the table.
“Let me change out of my robe,” I said, palming a tube of super glue from my trusty junk drawer. “I’ll be right back.”
