by C. L. Bevill
“Ain’t it grand?”
“Get some rest, Demetrice,” Miz Adelia called up the stairs. “You get to decapitate the mayor at noon.”
•
“Bubba, I got three groups from Dallas/Fort Worth coming into the Amtrak station in twenty-two minutes,” Sheriff John Headrick said as he walked toward his official county car with Bubba trailing after him. Bubba had caught a ride in with Roscoe Stinedurf, the Snoddy’s closest neighbor.
“The daggoned committee volunteered me to guide traffic,” the sheriff added, “and it ain’t like I got nothing else to do.” The last part was pure sarcasm.
Sheriff John, as the sheriff was commonly known, was one of the few men taller than Bubba in the county, but there the resemblance ended. Steel gray was the sheriff’s primary color. His hair was gray. His eyes were gray. His demeanor was gray. Even the scar at his throat, which was a remnant of dealing with the Christmas Killer, was grayish. Fortunately, the sheriff’s uniform was khaki.
“The note said someone would be murdered,” Bubba announced solemnly.
Sheriff John paused to give Bubba his patented and bestest “stinky eye.” The sound of the sheriff’s voice had been changed by the damage to his esophagus. It sounded like Barry White grumbling nonsensical murmurings next to a reverberating train engine. “I ain’t got time for this, Bubba. Ifin this is part of the Murder Mystery Festival then go see the Murder Points Committee. They’re down by city hall. They got the big table under the sign that says ‘If someone is dead and you know whodunit, see us here.’”
Bubba hesitated. “Did they really put that sign up?”
Sheriff John nodded firmly. “With gleeful pomp and ceremony. Mayor Leroy was giggling at the time. Of course, he was well and truly befuggered by the demon drink. I wonder what he’s like when he’s sober.”
“Dang. Ma’s lost her mind.”
“That was my consensus a long time ago,” Sheriff John said, “when she done tole me that she killed your father by dropping a pianee on his head.”
“We don’t have a piano.”
“And therein lay the problem.” Sheriff John looked Bubba up and down. He took in his pearly white shirt, which had been pressed, and his pristine Levi’s, which had also been pressed. The Stetson on Bubba’s head hadn’t been pressed but it was immaculate. “You must be meeting Gray today.”
Bubba sighed loudly, ignoring the last part. “The note ain’t part of the Murder Mystery Festival.”
Sheriff John took a step toward his Bronco and then stopped. His broad shoulders settled into a highly reluctant nonverbal acceptance. “Let’s see it.”
Bubba extracted the note from his shirt pocket. He had taken the time to find a Ziploc baggie, but the only baggie he could find already had half a chicken sandwich in it, so he’d solved that problem by eating the sandwich. After all, he had a lot of weight to maintain. But written on the outside of the Ziploc baggie was “This sammy belongs to ME!” and “ME!” was underlined three times in three different colors. Based on extensive and previous Sharpie usage, Bubba suspected that the sandwich had belonged to Brownie Snoddy. Brownie was Bubba’s cousin’s son, and who had been visiting for most of the summer. But Brownie had been collected by his mother, Virtna, the very last week before the Murder Mystery Festival. This was a fact that made Bubba suspect that someone would attempt to “murder” Brownie several times if he had been around to participate, or it was more likely that Brownie would have gotten cheerfully too participatory in the festival.
This also made Bubba wonder how old the chicken sandwich had been and whether or not he would be getting a flaming case of salmonella poisoning soon. It was also likely that the “chicken” in the sandwich was not “chicken” at all, and Bubba felt his stomach protest.
Sheriff John turned toward Bubba and took the baggie by the edge, read the writing, and looked at him with disbelief.
Bubba shrugged weakly. “I touched the paper but only me. It was the only baggie I could locate.”
Sheriff John turned the baggie to one side and then aimed it for the morning sunlight. “‘If someone finds this note…’” he muttered and trailed off. “You said it was in an old part?”
“An air cleaner for the Chevy. The one on my truck punked out.”
Sheriff John laughed. “Air cleaner didn’t make the truck’s brakes fail. Do you know how much a telephone pole costs to replace?”
“No, that was a clevis pin,” Bubba said. “Purely coincidental that the two died at the same time.”
Sheriff John paused. “Really? A little, itty-bitty clevis pin?”
“Bad design flaw in the brake pedal assembly of a 1954 Chevy 3100, ifin you’ve a mind to buy one.”
“My wife has to take her New VW Beetle to the VW dealer thirty miles away to change the battery on account of the fact they got everything shoved in there so tight. Think those VW people did it on purpose so an average fella couldn’t swap out a battery. You need a computer hook-up just to tell it that you’re going to change it.” Sheriff John turned the baggie this way and that.
“I knew there was a reason Culpepper’s don’t work on VWs.”
“You’ve had this part for eight months? You don’t think Miz Demetrice stuck this in here as a joke on you? Or maybe that obnoxious little turd, your second cousin or is it first cousin once removed?”
“Brownie’s prank tastes are somewhat more plebeian. Just before he left, he smeared peanut butter on my steering wheel.”
“Smooth or crunchy?”
Bubba glared at Sheriff John.
“Okay, it ain’t your ma and it ain’t Miz Adelia, I take it. And you don’t think Brownie would go this here route, am I right?”
Bubba nodded.
“Paper looks old.”
“That box that the part was in hasn’t been opened for a long time.”
“Why do you say that?”
“There’s dust on the inside of the box and on the papers that it was wrapped in. Grimy dust as if it sat in some automobile shop for a long time. Like maybe years.” Bubba sighed again, and it was heartfelt. “Also, it sat in the potato cellar for those eight months. Ifin it was a joke, then someone stopped giggling about it a long time ago.”
“This air cleaner is an original part,” Sheriff John said. He glanced at the note and then at Bubba. “It’s nearly sixty years old?”
“I’m always looking to find original parts for Ol’ Green.”
“Why don’t you put aftermarket stuff on it, for the love of St. Francis’s befuddled bandicoot?”
“Wasn’t meant to have parts made in Taiwan,” Bubba replied simply.
“Okay, let’s get past that,” Sheriff John said. He handed the baggie-covered note back to Bubba. “Cain’t do anything about it.”
Bubba glowered. “Someone wrote a note for help. Mebe they dint know it would take so long. Mebe it dint help what happened to them. But it’s not too late.”
Sheriff John stared at Bubba suspiciously. “You sure this isn’t part of that funky festival?”
“I dint know what Ma had done until yesterday.”
Sheriff John chuckled again. “Lloyd said you were somewhat surprised when he was still alive.”
“The note,” Bubba reminded Sheriff John.
“Hellfire and brimstone, boy,” Sheriff John said. “You don’t know who wrote it. You don’t know when it got into that Chevy part. You don’t know much about nothing. Where did you get the part?”
“First Monday Trade Days up to Canton,” Bubba said.
Sheriff John sighed. “That’s about two or three square miles of folks selling everything from used underwear to Queen Elizabeth’s fingernail clippings.”
That was true. First Monday Trade Days in Canton, Texas took place once a month. There was a plethora of traders who set up their tables, wares, and whatever they could bring, and there was a multitude of folks who came by the thousands to wander around the grounds and get gouged for anything they could spend money on. On the p
lus side, a savvy consumer could find something he might not see advertised on Craigslist. Bubba had heard rumors about still-in-the-box Chevy parts for the’50s era trucks and he had hauled his tushy up there to check it out. He had hit pay dirt and parted with the cache of money that he’d located in an old boot in a third floor closet of the mansion. From there, the parts went into the potato cellar until he needed them.
No one could have anticipated the purchase, and furthermore, the purchase had occurred shortly before the Christmas Killer had begun her homicidal, seasonal rampage. That was the same Christmas Killer, whose murderous need for revenge had garnered so much attention for Pegramville, that she became the impetus for Pegramville’s First Annual Murder Mystery Festival.
Sheriff John glanced at his watch. “I got to go. Those folks who came in yesterday tried to investigate some roadkill because Mary Jean Holmgreen was late directing them to the buses. They even had some poor bastard doing an on-the-spot autopsy. I didn’t know coons had so many intestines.” He spun on his boots and trotted to the Bronco before Bubba could protest.
“What do I do with this note?” Bubba called.
“Give it to Arlette Formica,” Sheriff John said as he dove into the Bronco.
Bubba watched the Bronco roar to life and Sheriff John drive away. Bubba decided that the sheriff’s missus was likely participating in Pegramville’s First Annual Murder Mystery Festival and was also likely the primary motivation behind Sheriff John’s participation.
Arlette Formica was one of the telephone operators for the local nine-one-one line. Recently she had been promoted to the front desk, since the sheriff’s department had lost one Robert Daughtry AKA Morgan Roquemore to the idiosyncrasies of the law and the unlawfulness of being an accomplice to murder in the first degree.
Oh that awful turnover.
Bubba decided he wasn’t going to give the note to Arlette, who was a nice enough individual. Instead, he was going to wait for his previously scheduled lunch with the luscious Willodean Gray and give it to her. At least he knew that something would be done with it.
Grimacing, Bubba tucked the note back in his pocket. Then he went to find his mother. He knew where she was to be located. She was probably on the Murder Points Committee. In all likelihood she was the queen of the committee and would be ruling the outfit with an iron fist.
Ten minutes later, he waded through a group of people who were arguing about a dead body. “Clearly, the body was stabbed first, then eviscerated,” one man said loudly.
A woman wearing the festival’s blue shirt with the sparkly skull and crossbones said, “It doesn’t say that he was stabbed and then eviscerated.”
Bubba passed the corpse, who was lying in front of Wok This Way. The owner of the Chinese food restaurant was standing in the open door, shaking his fist at the group of people.
“No bodies here! No dead people here in front of my restaurant! Call police! Call coroner! Call Department of Sanitation!” Sam Jones yelled. Bubba knew that Sam was of Chinese descent, but he also knew that Sam often pretended to be more “Chinese” than he actually was. “Health inspector close me down!” He saw Bubba and clapped his hands. “Bubba, you big boy! You carry body to that place!” He pointed to the coffee shop two doors down. Apparently business had been booming at the Brew Ha-Ha and in Sam’s estimation, could better take the hit that a “dead body” would bring.
Bubba looked down and saw Mark Evans lying about three feet away from the Chinese restaurant’s front door. It didn’t really seem to be an issue since it was only about 10 a.m., and he wouldn’t be opening his doors for business until 11:30 a.m. But anything that might make Sam lose business made him nervous. Bloody corpses, although patently fake because Mark abruptly sneezed, made Sam throw a conniption.
“Is he still alive?” someone asked sotto voce as if speaking loudly might cause the formerly “dead person” to die again, or perhaps it was precisely the opposite.
“Sorry,” Mark muttered. He kept his eyes closed as he added, “I’m dead. Really I am.” Mark was a local student who dabbled in various working environments while he put himself through college. He had once worked for Bufford’s Gas and Grocery the same as Bubba, and he had also worked as a process server for Edward Minnieweather. That business opportunity had ended badly when Mark attempted to serve Daniel Lewis Gollihugh, who had remonstrated being served, and beaten Mark to a bloody pulp. Mark was apparently in the “dead body” business at the moment. He reached down to adjust the mess of sausage links that had been liberally dunked in ketchup.
Ketchup sales are up anyway, Bubba thought. He shrugged ruefully at Sam and moved on, while two people argued about whether or not they should turn the body over to look at his back.
A block later, Bubba waded into the crowd at city hall. The grounds were full of booths and tents. Murder kits and investigatory tools were being sold at every corner. A man looked at Bubba and said, “You need the Polliwog Genuine Master Sleuth App for your smart phone, don’t you?” He didn’t wait for Bubba to answer, but went on, “It records all your thoughts about your case and your suspects. It even tallies up lists of evidence. It’s been sold to three police forces in these here greater United States. Also one in Guam, but I’m not sure what they do with it there.”
“I don’t have a smart phone,” Bubba said, and the man made a noise. He quickly turned away looking for a new victim. “YOU! Yes, you!” the man bellowed suddenly at a couple who were both wearing the telltale blue shirts with sparkly skull and crossbones. “You need the Polliwog Genuine Master Sleuth App for your smart phones! You are a garden sloth of a detective if you don’t have the Polliwog Genuine Master Sleuth App for your smart phones!”
Bubba slogged his way through the crowds. He likened the experience to delving through an Amazonian jungle. All he lacked was a large machete and bearers.
He heard the noise before he could see it. A large tent blocked his way. Then he came around the corner and saw that his mother was speaking into a microphone as she stood on a stage. Several people stood beside her with large smiles on their faces. There was Mayor John Leroy, Jr., who was visibly tottering on the stage as he simultaneously tried to smile and not fall down. Judge Stenson Posey stood on Miz Demetrice’s left. He was dressed in a blue three-piece suit, complete with a red “power” tie, which looked odd since Bubba was used to seeing the judge only in black robes. On his left stood Mrs. Posey, who smiled uneasily and looked as if she would be happier baking cookies in a large comfy kitchen. She might have been a poster girl for the Martha Stewart factory of homemaker clones complete with an apron that said “Too many cooks in the kitchen?” on the upper part. The rest was blocked by the fold of the fabric. Another man, whom Bubba didn’t immediately recognize, stood on the mayor’s right side. The black-suited individuals lurking around the base of the stage gave it away. It was the present governor of Texas, who was retiring at the end of his term because he wanted to focus on his memoirs.
Miz Demetrice Snoddy was the Snoddy matriarch, although she was the first to admit she had married into the family. She was more than a foot in height shorter than her only beloved son, but her eyes were the same cornflower blue. She wore a matching dress that was only a shade lighter than her eyes. The shoes were white as was the handbag and her hair neatly done into a chignon at the base of her head.
All in all, it was difficult to believe that such a woman was a virtual dynamo in her daily activities. If something were worth doing, then it was worth doing in an exciting and vigorous fashion, and that was her maxim. Also, “Damn the torpedoes,” “Damn the communists,” “Damn the copycat, Susan Teasdale,” and “Damn ya’ll, ifin you don’t agree with me,” were common adages in her repertoire.
Bubba paused as he took in the large crowd listening to his mother. It wasn’t unusual that she was speaking to big groups, but it was unusual that she wasn’t waving a protest sign or threatening anyone with legal maneuvers. There was even a group of reporters replete with camera cr
ews.
The words trickled into Bubba’s consciousness, and he braced himself. It wasn’t beneath his mother to use the Pegramville’s First Annual Murder Mystery Festival as a launching point for another one of her crusades.
“…this wonderful opportunity to announce a late entry into the gubernatorial race,” Miz Demetrice said. Bubba thought, Not Ma. Please God, Ma would make a lousy governor. Texas would likely secede and then attack California or something equally abysmal.
However, it did make sense on account that the frontrunner of the race had been caught by the ever-nosy mass of newspeople and had declared his impending retirement.
“…what better place to announce such an event than at a festival that condemns the crimes of those who would take the innocent lives of others,” Miz Demetrice went on. Bubba thought, Some of them people weren’t that innocent, and how in tarnation is announcing a race for the governor’s seat appropriate at a murder mystery festival?
“..with the endorsement of our governor, the honorable Soloman Teamus,” Miz Demetrice continued. Bubba thought, The five illegitimate children he fathered don’t have a dang thing to do with his “retirement”?
“…I give you the next governor of Texas,” Miz Demetrice said into the microphone, soaking up all the anticipation.
Bubba waited. His heart thumped a few times and then stopped.
“The honorable Stenson Posey,” Miz Demetrice finished with an elegant hand movement toward the judge.
The audience burst into a cheery round of applause. Bubba’s heart started again as relief poured through his body. Ma as governor of the great Lone Star State would be like putting Dr. Frankenstein in charge of MIT.
Apparently murder mysteries and political maneuverings went together like movies and popcorn.
Okay then.
Chapter Four
Bubba and the Maneuvering Mother
