The Last Death of Jack Harbin

by Terry Shames

From the way Hector is dressed when he answers the door, in baggy shorts and a ripped T-shirt, I’m pretty sure he’s not a church-going man. “Samuel, what can I do for you?” Suspicion hoods his eyes.

  “I’m here to talk to Louis, if he’s up.”

  “My boys are both up. I don’t hold with kids sleeping half the day. But I need to know what this is about.”

  He keeps me standing on the porch. “I need to know if Louis and some of the players might have been involved in a prank having to do with Coach Eldridge.”

  “My boys don’t do pranks.”

  “Hector, Louis is a leader on the team. Even if he wasn’t personally involved, he might know something about it.”

  I’m hanging onto my temper by a thread. Cardoza sizes me up, trying to see how far he can go. Then he sticks his head back into his house. “Louis, get out here.”

  Louis is dressed in jeans and a bright, white T-shirt. His hands are stuck in his back pockets, but as he approaches us, he pulls them out and lets them hang by his side. He tries to read his daddy’s expression, then hopes to find more in mine. “Yes sir?”

  “Mr. Craddock needs to ask you a question. I don’t need to tell you that I want the truth.”

  “No, sir. I mean, yes sir.” His cheeks flare up red.

  “Son, have you gotten wind of any prank involving Coach Eldridge?”

  “Like what?”

  His daddy’s voice is like a whip. “Like anything!”

  “No sir, not at all.”

  “What’s this about?” Cardoza says.

  “Coach is missing. Left yesterday morning and didn’t come home.”

  “And you think my son has something to do with that?” His voice jumps a couple of decibels.

  “Hector, I don’t know your son. I only know he’s the quarterback, and that a lot of people were upset when he was kept out of the game against Bobtail and again last Friday night. I thought maybe some kids decided to take Boone for a ride and make him walk home. Kid stuff.”

  Louis’s face is bright red now. “No, sir. Nobody would do anything like that. I mean, if they did, I don’t know anything about it.”

  “Can you think of anybody who might have been madder than anybody else about what coach did?”

  “If I was you,” Cardoza’s voice cuts ice, “I’d look to that blowhard LoPresto and his gang. They’re mighty quick to talk about retribution when the coach makes decisions they don’t like.”

  “I’ll talk to Gabe. Sorry to have disturbed you.”

  “Mr. Craddock?”

  Cardoza frowns at his son.

  “Yes, Louis?”

  “Will you let me know if you find coach? He’s the coach, and he’s fair. If he kept me out, he had his reasons. I’m not mad.” The boy’s father would do well to take some lessons from his son.

  As I haul myself into my truck, I hear sirens out on the highway. I have no reason to believe it has to do with Boone Eldridge, but it makes me nervous anyway.

  By now I’ll have to wait until church is over to talk to people, so I swing by the Eldridge place to see if Boone’s car has shown up. When I get there, a highway patrolman is sitting in his car in front of the house. In his fifties, he’s got his hat tipped way back on his head, and is listening to a country and western station on the radio.

  He climbs out of his car to greet me. He’s a bigger man than he looked sitting inside, with a paunch that looks like he’s carrying a bowling ball inside his shirt. I introduce myself and tell him Linda called me last night when Eldridge didn’t come home and I told her to call the highway patrol.

  “Craddock.” He sizes me up. “I remember you. Not that we know each other, but I remember hearing your name. You used to be chief of police here and made yourself a little reputation. I thought you’d retired a good while back. Why did the Eldridge woman call you?”

  “Our current chief is having some medical problems, and I guess she thought I might be the right person to talk to.”

  He laughs. “I’m reading between the lines here, but I expect what you’re not telling me is that whoever is in charge with the chief gone is two cards shy of a deck.”

  “He’s okay; just green. You boys find Boone Eldridge’s car?”

  “Not yet. I thought I’d come by and ask the wife some questions. By the way, my name is John Ryder.”

  We lean against the car. “I’ve gotten some information from Linda Eldridge,” I tell him, “but it won’t hurt for you to ask again. Maybe she’ll remember something she left out.” I’ve been thinking about that missing computer, and I mention it to him.

  “Uh, oh. That doesn’t sound good. Sounds like maybe he took off under his own steam. Maybe afraid somebody would find something on the computer that he didn’t want known. How well do you know him?”

  I shake my head. “Just to see him coach.”

  “Any rumors about him being into porn? Anything he wouldn’t want to have found out?”

  “Never heard anything like that.”

  “Eldridge. Wait a minute. I’m remembering the team lost to Bobtail this year, didn’t it?”

  “You have to bring that up?”

  He chuckles. “I know a couple of old boys who would have taken him out behind the woodshed after that game. They lost their shirts.”

  “They were gambling? On a high school game?”

  “Hell yes. Some people will gamble on anything.” He throws his hands up in denial. “Not me. I’m too close with a dollar. I’m about ready to retire and no way I’m risking one red cent.”

  “I’m with you on that.” I straighten up. “Not much use me hanging around here. Would you ask Linda to call me if she needs anything?”

  “I sure will.”

  I head to my truck, but what Ryder said about people gambling on the game sinks in. And my heart sinks with it. I walk back over to where Ryder has already climbed back into his car. He sticks his head out. “What’s up?”

  “Something I need to mention to you.”

  “Get in the car, here. Sun’s about to kill me.”

  I tell him about the coach’s beating at the hands of two strangers. And I tell him about the two men I saw in the stands that at the time I speculated were talent scouts from college.

  “I don’t like the sound of that,” Ryder says. He thinks about it for a minute. “You say the daughter said Eldridge told them he’d done what they asked?”

  “That’s the way she remembered it.”

  “It’s possible he threw that game.”

  I stare out the front window at Eldridge’s house. “Lord, I don’t want to think that. I can’t even begin to imagine what the town would do if they thought the coach threw the game.” And I’m thinking about how his poor wife would react if she knew. “I hope there’s another explanation.”

  But it makes sense. Friday night Eldridge had kept Louis out of the game again. And Linda told me Boone didn’t seem all that happy that the boys had won. Before I can get too far on this train of thought, Linda drives up with her two kids. When they get out of the car, Linda is scolding her son. “Your grandma is going to have a fit when she sees how you scuffed up her new car. Now go inside and get a rag and clean it off.” I guess it’s not Eldridge’s car after all.

  Ryder and I climb out of his car and approach the porch. The boy stops when he sees us, mesmerized by Ryder’s gun.

  “Scoot!” Linda says.

  When they are inside, Linda turns to us. “The kids are driving me crazy. They’re so upset.” She puts her hand to her mouth as if to hold back the question she wants to ask. But then she blurts out, “Are you here with bad news?” Her eyes are wide with fear. “Have you found Boone?”

  “No ma’am. Nothing like that.” Ryder takes off his hat and introduces himself. “I just thought maybe you could help me with a few questions. Mr. Craddock here has filled me in on most of it.”

  About then, Ryder’s cell phone starts up a racket. “Excuse me just a minute.” He steps away and turns his back.
>
  I walk up onto the porch next to Linda, worried because I hear Ryder’s voice, urgent. He comes back holding his hat in his hand. “Ma’am I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to come back later. We have an incident to deal with, and I’m going to have to help get things sorted out.” He flicks his eyes in my direction, eyebrows raised, and I get the idea that he has something to say to me.

  “But what about Boone?”

  “You know, until he’s been gone forty-eight hours, we don’t really get too excited, and you shouldn’t either.” He meets my eyes and moves towards his car, but then he turns back. “There is one thing, though. Chief Craddock told me your husband was beaten up not too long ago?”

  “You think that has something to do with it?”

  I chime in. “Ryder told me that there have been people betting on the games and some people lost a lot of money on the game with Bobtail. So I need to ask you something straight out.”

  “Anything,” she says.

  “You won’t like this, but it’s got to be asked. Have you ever had the impression that Boone didn’t do his best to win a game?”

  Linda’s eyes search mine, her expression turning furious as she understands what I’m implying. “You’re right, I don’t like it.” She looks over at Ryder, hovering near the porch. “Are you two suggesting that Boone would deliberately throw a game?”

  I let out a sigh. “You and Boone have any money problems?”

  Her hands are on her hips now, her dark eyes hard as steel. “Not any more than anyone else.” Her chin comes up. “Boone loves football, and he loves this team. He would never do anything like that. And I resent you saying so. It’s like you’re blaming Boone for disappearing.”

  “I’m just trying to figure out why those men beat up on Boone, and how it fits with what your daughter overheard Boone say to them.”

  “You keep my daughter out of this.” She moves in my direction, pointing down the steps. “Matter of fact, I think I made a mistake calling you. I’d like you to leave now. Mr. Ryder, I’m assuming the highway patrol will keep up the search.”

  Ryder is fingering the rim of his hat. “Of course we will, but like I said it’ll be forty-eight hours before we take it too seriously.”

  Linda makes a disgusted sound. “Just get out of my sight.”

  “Linda, I’m sorry to have upset you. But everything ought to be considered when you’re thinking about why Boone left.”

  “I’ll thank you to keep your considerations to yourself and not go spreading a rumor all over town,” she says.

  “No one will hear it from me.” I clamp my hat on my head and slink down the steps.

  When we reach his car, Ryder says, “Something tells me the lady protests too much. But now we’ve got bigger problems. I don’t know what’s going on in this little town, but you’ve got a couple men with guns threatening each other over on Third street.”

  “On Third? What’s the address?”

  “Not sure exactly. The cross street is Persimmon.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake! That’s Jack Harbin’s place. He’s the boy who got murdered.”

  I pull up behind Ryder’s car two blocks from the Harbin place. We can’t park any closer because the street is cordoned off at the corner. An ambulance idles at the curb. The EMS team is standing on the sidewalk, arms crossed, looking up the street toward Jack Harbin’s house. It takes about twenty minutes for an ambulance to get here from Bobtail, so this situation has been going on for a while. I remember the sirens I heard earlier as I was leaving Louis Cardoza’s house.

  Ryder and I duck under the tape. Two highway patrol cars are parked in front of the house along with the two Jarrett Creek squad cars. The patrolmen and cops are hunkered down behind their cars.

  There’s a black SUV parked on the lawn in front of Jack’s house. A man is crouched behind it holding a nasty-looking weapon I don’t recognize.

  “What the hell?” Ryder and I duck low and make our way to the nearest highway patrol car, where one of the officers is sitting down smoking a cigarette. His shotgun lies across his legs.

  “Elroy, what’s happening?” Ryder says.

  Startled, the patrolman tosses the cigarette onto the street, brings himself to a squat, and tips his hat. “Morning, Officer Ryder.” He points toward the house. “A neighbor called us about an hour ago and said some guy had gone up to the house several times pounding on the door and screaming to be let in.”

  “I assume that’s the guy behind the SUV?” Ryder says.

  “Yes sir, that’s what it looks like. The neighbor said the last time he went up there somebody inside opened the door and gunfire was exchanged.

  “Anybody know who he is?”

  “No, sir. We got here about twenty minutes ago and found the situation like this. He’s been holding us off with his weapon and he and a man in the house have been yelling at each other back and forth.”

  “Anybody get shot?” I ask.

  “We don’t know if anybody inside the house was injured or killed. But the guy outside seems to be all right.”

  “Well why the hell isn’t anybody challenging the guy behind the SUV?” Ryder says.

  “We tried and he threatened us, too. Said he’d shoot anybody that comes near him.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Ryder says.

  The man positioned behind the SUV suddenly springs up and runs to the front door and starts pounding on it. I recognize him now from the police department flyer they sent me from Mississippi. It’s Marcus, of Marcus Ministries. “Curtis, you let me in there,” he yells. “I have rights, and you know it. God has put you under my . . .”

  The door is yanked open and a hand pokes out holding a gun. “You go to hell!” It’s Curtis’s voice and he pops off a couple of shots.

  Marcus hollers and goes down, holding his leg. “You’ve shot me!” he screams.

  “I’ll shoot you again if you don’t get out of here!” Curtis slams the door.

  Ryder’s face is red from having to crouch down. I imagine that belly of his is giving him as much trouble as my knee is. I pull myself up using the handle of the car and reach out to help Ryder up.

  “Are you crazy? You’re going to get shot.”

  “Curtis isn’t going to shoot anybody else.”

  “You sure?”

  “I know a little something about this situation.”

  Ryder grabs the car handle like I did and hauls himself up. He nods toward the man on the porch who is writhing around on his back, moaning. We can see the blood on his pants now. “What are we going to do about him?”

  “Let me take care of it. Curtis!” I holler. “This is Samuel Craddock. I’m going to get this man off the porch. I don’t want you to shoot me.”

  Silence from the house.

  I start to walk around the front of the patrol car, but Ryder grabs me. “I don’t advise you to do anything until he acknowledges you.”

  I glance at the house and back at Ryder. “He’s shot the only person he’s after,” I say.

  “If you say so.” Ryder joins me and we walk toward the porch.

  One more time I yell, “Curtis, we’re approaching your victim now. Just give us a minute.”

  Marcus is moaning. He’s about forty and as big as Walter Dunn, with an oddly smooth face and collar-length hair. There’s a spreading stain of blood along his left thigh, but it doesn’t look too serious. If a major artery had been hit, blood would be gushing out. I stare down at him. “Your name Marcus?”

  “It might be. I need an ambulance. I’m hurt bad. And you need to arrest the man who shot me.”

  “Can you walk if you’re supported?”

  “I surely don’t think so.”

  I look at Ryder. “You think we can drag this man between us?”

  “I suppose we don’t have any choice. Those young ones aren’t likely to put themselves in harm’s way.”

  We each grab an arm and start dragging. Marcus yelps. “You’re going to make it worse.”r />
  “Well then stand up,” Ryder says. “You’re not hurt that bad.”

  We manage to get Marcus to his feet and support him on each side. My knee protests all the way to the patrol car, where Marcus slumps to the ground.

  Ryder says, “One of you boys get that ambulance over here.”

  “I need to know your full name,” I say to the victim.

  “Who are you?”

  “Chief Samuel Craddock.” It slips out without me thinking about it.

  “I don’t know why it’s any of your business.”

  “All right, we’ll do it your way.” I reach down and feel his back pockets and drag out his wallet.

  “Give that back!”

  I fish out his driver’s license, which confirms that he’s Marcus Longley of Waco, Texas.

  Suddenly James Harley charges over to me from where he’s been hiding. “What the hell do you think you’re doing here?” he says.

  Ryder sizes up James Harley and says, “He’s with me. You the police chief?”

  “I sure am.”

  “So you’d be Rodell Skinner?”

  James Harley flushes. “No, Chief Skinner is on medical leave. I’m acting chief while he’s gone.”

  “I didn’t get your name.”

  “James Harley Krueger.” He sets his hand on his gun, as if to assure himself that he’s got some power.

  “Well, Chief Krueger, I’m Officer Ryder of the Texas Highway Patrol, and I’m the senior man here. Can you tell me who all is inside the house?”

  James Harley darts a look at me. He could easily chew right through a two-inch nail. “It’s Curtis Harbin, and we believe he has his family with him.”

  I’m struck by his use of the word “we.” Maybe he thinks he’s become royalty, but more likely he’s worried that there may be some unknown blame to be apportioned and he wants to get a jump on sharing it.

  “And what makes you believe that?” Ryder says.

  “We talked to Becky Geisenslaw next door, and she said she heard a car get in late last night and she heard female voices. She looked outside and saw Curtis and a woman and some young children she didn’t recognize.”

  “Has anybody tried to talk to Curtis?”