by Parrish, PJ
He glanced at his watch. It was still early. He swung the Mustang south down the mud-rutted road.
A few miles down the road, Louis slowed the car. Cotton Town could have been picked up and set down on the edge of almost any fair-sized Southern town. Most places like Black Pool had a Cotton Town, a patchwork quilt of old homes set around a focal point of a general store, church, and gas station.
Plywood shacks listed under lopsided tin roofs. Clotheslines laden with laundry were festooned from yard to yard. Skinny dogs pulled against their chains, barking at children who romped in their red dirt playgrounds.
Louis brought the car to a stop in front of a house where a man sat on a porch. It was dusk, and curious eyes peered through open windows and from porch swings as he got out of the car. Some children ran up to the white Mustang and peeked inside. Louis watched them for a few seconds and then waved to the man studying him from the slanted porch. The man nodded cautiously. Louis walked through a broken gate and stood several feet from the porch, respecting the man’s territory. He introduced himself and waited for the man to respond.
“What do you want?” the man said finally.
“Information.”
“What kind?”
“I’d like to talk to someone who’s been here a good many years.”
“No one here wanna talk to you.” The man stood up. The combined stench of stale whiskey and urine drifted to Louis, and he took a step back.
“I really need some help.”
The man glared at him from beneath a green baseball cap. The brown skin on his forearms was scarred with sores, and his overalls were held together by multicolored swatches.
“I can be trusted,” Louis said finally.
The man pointed toward a house farther down. “Buford might talk wit ya. He likes to talk. HeTl talk to damn near anybody. That’s his place, the green one.”
Louis thanked him, and walked through the sand and across the faded asphalt road to Buford’s house, a flat green, shingled structure with several poorly constructed additions jutting out the sides. The additions were only partially completed, large sheets of thick plastic serving as walls. There was a pack of children playing around an old pickup seat in the front yard. Louis stepped on the porch and knocked lightly on the screen door.
Two dogs jumped at the screen, batted away by a big woman who came to the door. She was at least fifty, with midnight-black skin and a nest of rust-colored hair that resembled shredded steel wool. She folded her big arms across her breasts hanging low against her belly.
“May I speak to Buford?” Louis asked through the screen.
“Who are you?”
“Louis Kincaid. Sheriff’s Office.”
Her brows knitted. “I’ll fetch him. See if he wants to speak with you. You stay put, mister.”
Louis waited. He watched the kids play, small faces peeking at him from behind an old pickup seat. The woman returned and slapped open the screen door. “Buford says he’ll talk to you. C’mon in and have yerself a seat. He’s a comin’.”
Louis stepped inside and scanned the small musty room as he waited. On the wall were pictures of Ernie Banks and Jackie Robinson and a frayed Chicago Cubs pennant. An ancient Zenith sat directly in front of a stained chair. The worn couch was covered with an old sheet. A man appeared in the doorway of a narrow hall and Louis watched as he teetered toward his chair.
Buford was as dark and wrinkled as a prune, with a thin patch of white hair. Although his teeth were yellow and his fingernails brittle and cracked, there was something pleasant about the man. Buford’s bones cracked as he sat down, and he turned to the woman in the kitchen. “Lottie, the Cubs on yet?”
“Buford, it’s December,” came the irritated response. “I keep tellin’ ya. Baseball don’t start till spring. You wanna watch sports, you watch basketball. That’s all that’s on that damn TV.”
Buford mumbled something and looked at Louis. “Who the hell are you?”
“Detective Louis Kincaid. I would like to talk to you.”
“Turn off that damn TV, would ya? I hate goddamn basketball.”
Louis obliged him, and returned to his seat next to Buford. “I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“What about?”
Louis explained about the body and its location. “Best estimate is that it’s been there since the early sixties. I’m hoping to find someone who’s been around a good number of years and see if they remember anyone disappearing around then.”
“Good Lord, son, you say this man was hanged?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Can’t recollect anybody just up and vanishin’…’cept maybe…”
Louis leaned forward.
“There was a young ’un, let’s see…maybe that was sixty-seven, -eight. Can’t recollect the name of the family. Jus’ a young ’un, he was. I’ll think of it, sonny. I will. I think he lived out in Sweetwater. Nice boy…had a weird hand.”
Louis almost jumped to his feet. “Which one?”
“Right, I’m thinkin’. Strange lookin’ thing. Looked like his fingers were cut off.”
Wrong hand, but it was easy to confuse. “I need his name.”
“I’m thinkin’, I’m thinkin’.”
Louis sighed, trying to be patient. He pulled the plastic bag containing the medallion from his pocket. “I have this, too.”
Buford took the plastic bag and squinted at it. “Lottie! Bring me my glasses, would ya?”
Lottie brought a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles and Buford struggled to get them on. Then he peered at the medallion. “This here didn’t belong to no black boy.”
“Is it of religious significance?”
Buford shook his head. “No sir, don’t believe so. Looks like something maybe been passed from granddaddy to son, and so on.”
“Would it have been a gift?” Louis asked.
Buford pushed his lips together and contemplated the question. “More likely stolen. Probably what got him kilt. I tell ya what, there’s a jeweler in town called George Harvey. He might’n’ tell ya more about it.”
“We figure the man we found was fifteen to twenty years old.”
“That’d be ’bout right. This was a young ’un, he was.”
“What about this town of Sweetwater? Where is it?”
“Gone. Burnt up. I only ’member him ‘cause he went to my church. Charity Baptist.”
“The same Charity Baptist in town?”
“Nah, the one I’m talking about burnt to the ground. Folks don’t go theres no more. Fact is, all of Sweetwater was burnt. No folks left out that way now.”
Louis put the medallion away and rubbed his face. “Sir, can you think of anyone else who lost somebody mysteriously?”
“Nope, lots of folks disappear. They just go. Cain’t tell what happen to them.”
“People just don’t disappear.” Louis doubted his own words. His own father had just disappeared. “It’s important to me you try to remember the boy’s name.”
“I’ll git it, I’ll git it.”
Louis waited a few minutes but Buford looked more like he was falling asleep than thinking. Louis stood up, sighing. “If you think of anything else, please call the Sheriff’s Office,” Louis said. “Talk directly to me and not anyone else.”
“I don’t have a phone, sonny. Y’all hafta come back and see me.”
“Will do,” Louis shook his hand. Buford nodded sleepily and laid his head back. Louis said good-bye to Lottie and her dogs, and stepped outside. It was dark now, and colder. The kids in the street had gone inside and the neighborhood was empty, except for a couple of teenagers with a boombox on the corner. Louis could feel the vibrations of their music against his chest.
It was five-fifty when he swung into the parking space in front of Black Pool Jewelers. He bounded from the car, and pulled open the glass door to the store. Jewelry stores had always made him uneasy, like he didn’t really belong. Once, when he was twelve, he and a friend were in a store
like this, and the owner, a nervous white man, ran them out with a baseball bat, thinking they were going to rob him. Louis had gone looking for a gift for his foster mother. After that, he always thought of jewelry stores as places that existed only for the wealthy. This one, with its gold-plated glass cases and thick green carpeting, seemed no different.
A man in the back office spotted him and came toward the counter. “May I help you?” the salesman said.
“Yes, I’m looking for George Harvey. Is he in?”
“George Harvey is in. That’s me.”
George Harvey had a round face, oily gray hair, and lots of gold on his fingers. Louis pulled the necklace from the bag and laid it on the counter.
“My name is Officer Louis Kincaid, from the Sheriff’s Department. What can you tell me about this?”
George looked at it carefully, turning it over and over in his stubby fingers. Louis stared at the top of his bald head for almost a minute before speaking. “Anything you can tell me?”
“It’s very old. And it’s real silver. Where did you get it?”
“Off a dead body. I was hoping it might help identify him.”
“The bones you cops found?”
“Yes. The bones.”
The jeweler shook his head. “I don’t see how this could help. Surely there’s someone around who can identify the dead man.”
“Well, all we have is an old skull, Mr. Harvey, and I don’t think it would do much good to show folks a Polaroid of that, do you?” Louis smiled.
George did not look up from the medallion and replied flatly, “I suppose not.”
“Any chance of tracing it?” Louis asked, shifting his weight impatiently.
“I don’t see how.” George laid it on the glass. “It’s just an old relic.”
“You don’t recognize it, then?”
He shook his head. “Never saw it before in my life.”
“And you’ve been here a long time?”
“Almost ten years. My grandfather ran the store before me.”
Louis put it back in his pocket. “Thanks anyway.” When he got to the door, he turned. “Say, you don’t suppose a Civil War expert or somebody like that could trace it, do you?”
“I doubt it.”
“Thanks again, and if you think of anything, give me a call, would you?”
The jeweler nodded. “I will. Officer.”
After Louis had left, George Harvey looked at his watch and walked to the door, locking it. Then he pulled the blinds, and returned to the counter. Standing in the darkened room, he picked up the phone and dialed a familiar number. When he heard the voice on the other end, he hesitated.
“This is George,” he said. “He has the medallion.”
Chapter 7
Sheriff Dodie turned from the window. “He went to see Grace Lillihouse?”
Junior propped his feet on the sheriff’s desk and slipped the toothpick in and out of his mouth. “That’s what I hear. I also hear Miz Lillihouse wasn’t none too happy ’bout it, either.”
Dodie frowned. “Christ, now I suppose Max’ll be calling.”
“When you gonna put the reins on Louis, Uncle? He’s way outta line here with this case. Somebody oughta get hold of that boy and explain how things is done down here. Seems to me. Sheriff, that’s your job, if’n you ask me.”
“Well, nobody’s asking you. Junior, so shut up. Git him in here.”
Junior dragged his feet off the desk and slowly stood up. “You gonna send him out to Earl’s place? Ethel’s been wantin’ to know about the autopsy.”
“I reckon it oughta be done in person.”
Junior opened the door and hollered for Louis. Sheriff Dodie sat down behind his desk and removed his red cap, slapping it against the blotter. Louis appeared at the door, and waited. The sheriff motioned him in.
“Y’all want me to stay. Sheriff?” Junior asked.
“Nooo,” the sheriff said, agitated, “I don’t want you to stay. Git outta here. Louis, you sit down.”
Junior banged the door closed, and the sheriff waited until his shadow disappeared from behind the frosted glass before speaking.
“I understand you paid a visit to Miz Lillihouse yesterday,” he said, slipping on his cap and leaning back in his chair.
Louis nodded.
“What the hell for?”
“To ask questions.”
Dodie shook his head. “I told you—”
“I know what you told me,” Louis replied, leaning forward, spreading his palms, “but how can I conduct an investigation without asking questions?”
“There’s just a proper way to go about it.”
“I’m going about it the only way I know how. I ask questions.”
“Well, you’re asking the wrong people, Kincaid.”
“Oh, it’s the right people. Maybe the wrong questions, but the right people.”
Dodie took a deep breath. “Leave the Lillihouses alone.”
“I can’t promise that.”
“Goddammit, Kincaid, do you know who you’re working for?”
“The people.”
“Don’t get smart with me.”
Louis set his jaw. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
Dodie pointed toward the outer office. “There’re plenty of guys out there who would’ve given their mama’s left tit to have your job. Larry almost quit when I hired you for it instead of him.”
Louis watched the sheriff chew on his cigar.
“Kincaid, things aren’t the same down here as you might be used to,” Dodie said. “You’d better start understanding that. You gotta take things slow and easy-like. People don’t like change here much. You gotta go about it a different way.”
“A different way or no way at all?” Louis asked.
Dodie blew out his smoke, long and slow. “You’re pushing me, Kincaid.”
Louis leaned forward in his chair. “Look, Sheriff, you and I both know your bringing me here was a mistake. But I’m stuck here, and like I told you before, I will do you a good job.” He paused. “I believe that things can be better, and being a cop is the only way I know how to do that. That’s why I became a cop in the first place. I’ll try to do things the way you want, but I won’t compromise the law. I can’t work like that.”
Dodie leaned his head back against the chair. “That’s a nice speech, Kincaid,” he said, “a real nice little speech.”
Louis could feel his heart beating hard in his chest. The ceiling fan squeaked slowly above his head. Louis looked at the Confederate flag and back at Dodie, trying to calm himself.
Dodie was staring at him with narrowed eyes. Slowly, he reached over and ground the cigar out in the ashtray. He picked up a folder and tossed it across the desk toward Louis.
“Got the report back today on Earl Mulcahey,” he said. “We’ve ruled it accidental.”
Louis snatched it up and scanned it quickly. “Sheriff, we haven’t even had time to investigate this yet. I haven’t even looked at it.”
“District Attorney Bob Roberts looked at it and says it looks accidental to him. That’s good enough for me.”
Louis hesitated. A medical examiner’s report sent right to the district attorney? Jesus, did Dodie have any authority in this place? A better question was, did he himself have any? Louis suppressed a sigh. Now was not the time to argue. Hell, it probably was a hunting accident.
“Earl’s widow needs it for the insurance,” Dodie said. “Earl probably had a bunch. He sold it for a living. I want you to take a run out there and give Ethel the news.”
Louis rose, taking the report. He was glad to have an excuse to get out of the office.
“Louis,” Dodie called after him, “take Junior with you.”
Louis walked back to his desk and called to Junior that they were heading out to the Mulcahey place. Junior was talking with Larry in the corner, and waved a weak acknowledgment. Louis picked up his radio and headed toward the door, stopping at the glass to wait.
Al
ong the wall, from the front door to the sheriff’s office, was a row of eight-by-ten photographs of former sheriffs. The gallery started in 1911 with a sour-looking, bulbous-nosed man and went all the way to 1976 when Dodie had assumed Greensboro County’s most elite law-enforcement position. This was the first time that Louis had looked at the grim white faces that he passed every day. Most of the photos were in stark black-and-white, making the cops look like extras from The Maltese Falcon.
His eyes settled on one man, and at first he didn’t know why until he read the name: Jedidiah S. Dodie. He had served as sheriff from 1951 to 1959. Louis glanced at the sheriff’s closed door.
“You ready, Kincaid?” Junior asked, knocking him slightly as he brushed past.
Louis nodded and followed him out into the brisk sunshine.
The Mulcahey home was a pale yellow ranch-style farmhouse shaded by sprawling oak trees. It brought back to Louis one of his few good memories of Black Pool, the drive on Sunday to church when he was very small. Just vague memories of sitting in the back of someone’s rattling car, face pressed to the window, the tight collar of the thin cotton shirt squeezing his neck. They had to drive past the white part of town to attend the Good Hope Community Church, and they had passed many of these houses. Simple, neat little places with covered porches, manicured roses and swing sets in the backyard. Places that looked like the people who lived in them were happy.
Ethel was a plump sparrow of a woman with brown hair and a colorless face. She had gentle eyes, a mother’s eyes. She held the screen door for the officers and directed them toward the living room. There was a radio playing quietly from the kitchen. Louis let her sit down before speaking.
“We’ve officially ruled your husband’s death accidental. I need to tell you, Mrs. Mulcahey, how sorry we are for your loss. I don’t know what else to say. Sheriff Dodie sends his condolences as well.”
