Even When You Win...

by Dave Balcom

  “Not necessary,” she interrupted. “I’ll e-mail that photo to my office in a minute, but I want Sheriff Chance and Riley to see this face.”

  Ed punched Print, and then switched out the chip. “There’s that buck again. He’s making regular visits.”

  Riley walked over behind him, “He eatin’ at your garden?”

  “Not so as I noticed, and I’m sure I would. But the Swans back behind us, they’ve got a big garden. He may be using our yard to get from the river to their place.”

  The printer spit out the photo, and Hurst handed it to Riley. “You know him?”

  “Not really. I’ve seen him around. He grew up here, but...”

  Sheriff Chance erupted when he saw the photo, “Damn!”

  “What?” Ed asked immediately.

  “Billy Simpson. He grew up in Kirksville; married one of the Flynt gals from over there. Moved over here when he got the job at the post office.”

  “Just how many Flynt girls are there?” Richards asked.

  “Too many to count,” Riley said. “There were five in my graduating class at school, and three guys. I never got to know them well. They were all from different families – cousins, nieces – their family tree must resemble a thicket.”

  At that Ed chuckled, “I couldn’t describe it any better from my point of view.”

  “Me neither,” Chance said.

  “You think he’s involved?” Riley asked, his fists were clenching and unclenching in a way that alarmed me.

  “You don’t want to go off half-cocked here, Riley,” I said while looking to Richards for support.

  “You don’t want to go off at all, son,” Chance spoke softly. “I think the agents and I will pay a little visit to Mr. Simpson when he’s through for the day.”

  He looked at Hurst who had her phone out, “I’m making a quick call to a postal inspector friend of mine.” She was leaving the room, “I’ll be right back.”

  She returned about fifteen minutes later. “If we go to the post office right now, we’ll be there in time to meet Mr. Simpson when he comes in off his route.”

  Both the sheriff and Richards got up and headed to the door where she had been standing. I got up as if to follow them.

  Richards stopped me at the door. “You’re going where?”

  “I thought I’d tag along with you...”

  “Nope. You’re out of this. You wait; you may not like it, but you have to wait.”

  With that he was gone, closing the door softly between us.

  “Join the club, Mr. Stanton,” Riley said from across the room.

  “It’s five o’clock somewhere,” Ed said from the wet bar. “I don’t like drinking alone.”

  Rita and Ed had spent the rest of the afternoon fielding calls from their children. Ed had taken up residence in his bedroom upstairs; Rita was on the porch. The rest of us were hanging around the kitchen where Roxie was supervising the food chain with Gerald’s help.

  At about seven, Cindy, Gene, Donna and Junior arrived complete with luggage and sleeping bags for the kids.

  “Hi, Mr. Stanton,” Cindy greeted me, and then she put her arms around me in a huge hug. “I’m so sorry this has happened to you and Jan, but I’m really grateful that you’re here with Mom and Dad.”

  Gene shook my hand and gave me a quick embrace, and then he turned to Riley, “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Me neither, Gene.”

  Rita came in off the porch and her face broke into a huge smile at the sight of her daughter and family. “What a great idea!”

  “You didn’t know they were coming?” I asked.

  “Heavens, no, but I’m thrilled they did. It’s easier to keep an eye on them here, I’m sure.”

  At that moment the front door opened and Crawford, Clara, and Jentrelle walked into the house. Rita gave out with a shriek of joy and rushed to hug them.

  “This place is going to get crowded,” I said to Riley.

  He was actually beaming, “It’s worth it.”

  Crawford was working his way towards his younger brother, and I stepped out of the way. They met in a heartfelt hug. Cindy was standing beside me, and watching her two adopted brothers. A tear was in the corner of her eye, defying gravity.

  Ed was in full innkeeper mode. “Cindy, Gene? You two and your kids are set up in the larger upstairs bedroom across the hall, right? Crawford, Clara? That puts you three in the smaller room where Jim’s been lodged.

  “Jim, you’re going to move to the basement play room. There’s a cot we can set up for you there; Riley, Roxie and Gerald can have the bedroom down there...okay?”

  “Where are we going to put Peter and Matt and their families?” Crawford asked with a gleam in his eyes.

  “What?” Ed asked. “Are they coming too?”

  “Matt and his family are driving; they’ll be here late tomorrow.”

  “And Peter?”

  “He’s underwater for the next sixty days, but Janine and Sylvia are flying into St. Louis tomorrow. I’m going to go down and pick them up unless the Feds decide to bring them up.”

  The noise level had ramped up to the point where it seemed to me everyone was talking at once. I sidestepped out onto the porch, and then went out the back door. I walked around the house to the front door and climbed the stairs to the room I’d been using. I retrieved my stuff from the bathroom and packed my little bag and went downstairs. I guessed the door to the basement was part of the mud room that I’d seen but not been in. I knew it led to the garage.

  I decided to sit in my vehicle in the street and wait for Richards, Hurst and Chance to return. I had been sitting there remembering for the first time in years an experience from my service days, sitting in a truck parked along a street in Baghdad... As I recalled the sensations that had tugged at my concentration back then, I noticed a shadow moving in the shrubbery outside Ed’s house.

  I felt a jolt of adrenaline course through me, and I instantly checked my breathing and center. The jolt dissipated and I watched the shadow until it found a place to sit. It hunkered down and if I hadn’t seen it arrive, I would never have noticed it at all.

  I yearned for my revolver that was safely locked away in the Blue Mountains. I was trying to decide what to do about the shadow when the Sheriff’s car pulled up across the street. I rolled down my window and waved at him as he got out of his car. Richards and Hurst appeared on the other side, saw me in the dusk and walked to me.

  “What’re you doing out here?” Richards asked in a conversational tone.

  “Kids are arriving – the Hastings and the other Parker family just got here; place went nuts, I’ve been relocated to a sleeping quarter in the rec room downstairs, I just came out here to stay out of the way for a while.

  “How did you guys do with Mr. Simpson at the post office?”

  “Not great, but not awful. He had no idea why we wanted to talk with him, and it’s pretty obvious that he hasn’t known about the notes. Somebody in the sorting operation is putting those notes in the Sweets’ mail; he’s dropping them off is all.”

  “How do you know he’s telling the truth?”

  Hurst answered, “The same way you’d know; nobody’s that good a liar. He was really lost as to why we were talking to him.”

  “Did you get a lead on who might be involved in the sorting room?”

  Sheriff Chance spoke softly, “There are eight people working in that room and they’re all related to the Flynt clan.”

  “Wow.”

  “Sheriff,” I said, keeping my voice as low and normal as I could, “Do you have anybody assigned to watching this house.”

  “No. I’ve got cars at each end of the street to see if anything unusual turns the corner and heads this way.”

  “How about you, Archie?”

  “No, but I’m sure agents made the trip with each of the families that arrived tonight, why?”

  “’Cause there’s a person in that shrubbery over on the west side of the yard. I wa
tched him sneak in and take up a position off the glassed-in porch. I caught his movement when he came in, but when he hunkered down, he just turned into a shadow...”

  “Some of our field guys are capable of that. I’ll make a phone call and get a head count; see if everyone’s accounted for.”

  “Y’all gonna stay out here?” Sheriff Chance asked.

  “I think we should all go in,” Richards said, keeping his tone conversational. “Andy, can I get a chuckle out of you?”

  On cue, the pretty agent laughed a throaty chuckle that would seem to break up this little meeting. I got out, locked the doors and joined them as we walked up to the front door.

  Chapter 48

  Richards was talking on his phone, and I started introducing Andy around the kitchen. Her very presence, more as a reminder of why they were there than anything about her, brought a somber mood back in place.

  “We’re very fortunate to have Mrs. Hurst with us,” Rita said to the group. “She’s a comfort, as is...” and she was looking around, I realized, for Richards. “...Well, Agent Richards was here a moment ago... well, as you get to meet him, you’ll find him as nice and professional as Mrs. Hurst.”

  “I prefer Andy, folks; and I hope we can solve this and reunite your family and Mrs. Stanton so that you don’t have time to form a different opinion of me.”

  Her phone chirped at that point, and she opened it as she was walking towards the front door. As she walked down the hall, she stopped, turned and said, “Jim? Will you and Ed join me for a moment?”

  We followed her, and I heard the conversations resume in the kitchen, but it was quieter than before, and it disappeared all together as the front door closed behind us. The government vehicle was lit up across the street, and I could see Richards in the front seat talking to two men in the back seat.

  Andy opened the passenger door, but Richards asked her to go around and drive. “Jim, Ed? You know this character?”

  Ed and I both bent down to look into the rear seat, and saw two men, one clean shaven, wearing a blue nylon jacket with FBI and a shield where his shirt pocket would be. The other man had long, stringy hair, turning to gray, and he was at least a week past his last shave. He was also nursing a puffy eye and a split lip which had streaked blood down the front of his camouflage tee-shirt.

  “The guy on the left is one of our agents, if that’s any help,” Richards joked. “This other character, who carries no identification, was hiding in the shrubbery outside your porch; keeping an eye on you, we guess.

  “He wasn’t armed except for a three-inch jackknife, so I think observation was the mission. From the look of things around where we found him, it wasn’t his first night on the job.”

  “No,” Ed finally said. “I don’t know him.”

  “Well, we’re going to take him to see Sheriff Chance. I figure he or his troops will know of him. We’re going to be gone more than an hour, so I suggest you keep on your toes.

  “There’ll be a sheriff’s deputy parked here before we leave. But you boys better keep an eye open.”

  “Call us when you can,” Ed said.

  Andy started the car and we backed away just as a Sheriff’s cruiser pulled up behind the agents.

  “There’s your deputy; we’ll be on our way.” We watched the car pull out, smoothly accelerating down to the corner, and then out of our sight.

  We walked back to the cruiser, and the driver’s window came down. “Mr. Sweet.”

  “Hey, Rowdy,” Ed said softly. “You need anything?”

  The deputy raised a mug. “I’m fine. I only expect to be here an hour or so and I don’t expect to be busy.”

  “I hope that’s true,” Ed said and turned away towards his house.

  As we walked up the steps to the porch, Ed stopped abruptly, and then, as if he’d come to a decision, he turned around and headed towards his garage, “Come on, Jim. We’re not waitin’ unarmed.”

  We walked through the garage to the mud room, and then took the stairs to the basement. We walked through the rec room complete with a ping pong table and a bunch of chairs and couches surrounding a huge TV screen in one end. At the other end was a hallway that led to another guest room and bathroom. He opened a door on the right, across from the guest room, with a key.

  At the flip of a switch the room was bathed in harsh white light. “Bright enough for surgery,” I muttered.

  He leaned back and adjusted the rheostat and the light went dimmer, but it didn’t soften the antiseptic look of the room.

  I looked around. The walls were shelved in places, loaded with books and a variety of tools and gizmos I didn’t recognize. There were two massive gun safes against another wall.

  He opened the first safe and it too was shelved, holding an array of personal weapons.

  “I don’t have a Tack Driver, Jim, but this Beretta nine mill will probably feel good in your hand.”

  He handed the weapon to me, then reached back into the safe and came out with three more clips. “It shoots where you point it.”

  “You expectin’ a war, Ed?”

  He looked me in the eye, “No, I’m not. I’m expecting a peaceful evening with my family, but if a war starts, we’ll be ready.”

  He reached to the top of the safe and pulled out a small, black duffel. He then put two more automatics and a Colt revolver into the bag along with several clips and a box of ammo. “These are all forty-fives; Crawford and Riley are fond of the big bore weapons.”

  We locked up and went upstairs. In the kitchen everyone had found a seat, and Ed got their attention quietly. “The agents caught somebody keeping a watch on us,” he said without introduction. “They said it looked like he or somebody else had been hiding in that spot before, too.”

  “Who was it?” Riley asked.

  “I don’t know him; never saw him before, but I don’t really care, either.” He paused and looked at all of his gathered family, “I’m not too concerned, but just the same, we’re going to be careful. Boys, I’ve got weapons and ammo in this bag. Arm yourselves. Ladies? Don’t go outside alone. Make sure someone is with you whenever possible. I suggest you keep the kids in the house while you’re here.”

  “Oh, Daddy,” Cindy sniffed, “I...”

  “Me, too,” Roxanne put her arm around Cindy’s shoulder, her other was holding Gerald on her lap. “But I think Ed’s right. There’s something awful in play here, and I’m not willing to lose anyone else; not tonight and not ever.”

  Rita put her arms around Ed’s waist and smiled up at him, “You do know how to put a damper on a homecoming, don’t you?”

  That got a titter of a laugh from the rest of the family, and served to lighten the mood just a bit.

  At nine the agents were back, and everyone was sitting around the phone in the kitchen. Richards had met everyone, and he had told the assembled family that the mysterious watcher was unknown to the police who’d met him. His finger prints had been sent to the state and federal data bases, but the agents had left to return to us before any word came back.

  The phone rang, and Ed picked it up and put it on speaker. An agent in Ed’s office was on the extension, and a tap had been put on the line earlier in the afternoon.

  As he’d been instructed, Ed said nothing, just hung on to the phone, keeping the connection open. He stood there, holding the phone, saying nothing. I looked around and found everyone in the room had stopped in mid-whatever they were doing, and watched Ed do nothing.

  He had stood there for nearly a minute when the party at the other end finally spoke, “That’s going to do nothing for you but kill another kid...”

  Chapter 49

  When the phone disconnected at the other end, Ed nearly collapsed onto one of the bar stools surrounding the kitchen island. Rita rushed to him, but he pushed her away, and just sat there, slumped over, his head hanging to the point his chin was nearly on his chest.

  A sob came out of Roxie, and I knew she’d made the worst possible connection to the
kidnapper’s statement about killing another kid.

  “Hardest damn thing I’ve ever asked anyone to do,” Richards said just as his phone went off. “Richards here.”

  He nodded and I saw a bit of satisfaction flicker across his face. “Perfect.”

  He turned to the whole group, “They traced the call to the phone at the Square Peg. There are six people in the bar right now, and nobody had left by the time the caller hung up. An agent is assigned to follow each of those people when they leave.”

  “That trace was awfully quick,” I said. “I thought it took minutes, not seconds...”

  Richards frowned at my comment, and then gave me that sardonic look again, “That was before nine-eleven; this is the twenty-first century, and the NSA has been like a curtain over this town since yesterday...”

  “Is there an agent in the place already?” I asked.

  “Yeah, he walked in seconds after the phone was identified. He’s wearing a wire, and was able to discuss the situation with Peg herself in such a way that we got the head count and even know that the other five – all men – are playing eight ball for a buck a game and they’d love to have him join in.”

  Andy raised her head with a wide smile. “Is that Frank?”

  “It is,” Richards returned her grin.

  “That’s going to be a bit educational for the locals.”

  “Is he pretty good?” Ed asked.

  “Oh, yeah,” she nodded and smiled. “Grew up in the Bronx, and paid his way through NYU with a pool cue. That game might break up in a hurry.”

  “If he’s not careful, he might get his head broken,” Riley said. “The boys who play down there most nights won’t take kindly to some fast-shootin’ stranger.”

  “Knowing Frank, the first words out of his mouth were on the order of, ‘I know you can’t beat me, but do you have any problem with my joinin’ the game?’”

  “A real hustler, huh?” Ed said.

  “No, when they see how good he is, they don’t usually get mad, they generally appreciate being warned off.”

  “I don’t think you’re gonna see that reaction in the Square Peg,” Riley said. “More likely is that they’ll want to raise the stakes and then go furious over bein’ hustled.”