Early's Fall

by Jerry Peterson

  “Steph,” Early said, “that's a mighty nice Beretta you got there. Mose is going to take it from you, then you're going to come out to me.”

  Dickerson inched to the side. He held his double-barrel firm in his trigger hand, while with the other he took the pistol from the Israeli.

  Stephanowitz stared at Dickerson, his eyes empty of emotion. Then he turned away, to Early, and walked down the steps and into the rain.

  “The boy really your son?” Early asked as he lowered his rifle.

  “I saw myself in his face, in his eyes,” Stephanowitz said.

  “He's not his son. He's mine,” Smitts bellowed from the side.

  Early swung around. “Bill, that's enough from you. . . . Dan'l, throw him in the back of your cruiser and haul him to jail. Hutch and I, we'll come along with Mose.”

  “What about the Clay deputy?”

  “I expect we're gonna find him in a ditch somewhere.” Early put his arm around Stephanowitz's shoulders. “How do you like our Kansas rain?”

  “It's cold.”

  “Not to us. We've been waiting months for this one. . . . Where's your car?”

  “In Mister Smitts's barn.”

  “Should have guessed. . . . Steph, I'm feeling generous because you didn't ventilate old Bill and me. I'm going to let you get in your car and drive away on your promise that you'll catch a couple flights to Tel-Aviv or Haifa or wherever home is for you, and you never come back here.”

  “Go without my son?”

  “You got that right. From what I read in the papers, it's a dangerous life in your country right now, still a lot of shooting. He'll do better here. And he's got two sets of grandparents who want him.”

  CHAPTER 25

  * * *

  September 26—Monday Morning

  The Chase

  Early sat rubbing his face at the trestle table in Walter and Nadine Estes's kitchen, exhaustion showing in the gray skin beneath his eyes, the kitchen flush with the aromas of a breakfast in the making.

  Walter, across from Early, slurped his coffee, his white hair uncombed. Nadine, in well-worn bib overalls and an apron, stood at the stove, stirring crumbled bacon and chopped onions into scrambled eggs crackling in a skillet.

  Thelma came in, a cotton bathrobe over her nightgown. She leaned on Early and wrapped her arms around his shoulders.

  “You all right?” she asked. “You didn't sleep well. Kicked off the covers more than once last night, rouncing around.”

  “God awful memories. . . . Thel, Bill killed a Clay deputy yesterday.”

  “You can't blame yourself for that.”

  “I told his sheriff he'd be working for me. I was responsible for him.”

  “You couldn't know it was going to happen.”

  “That doesn't make it any easier.”

  Nadine Estes placed a plate of eggs and biscuits in front of Early. “Jimmy, you gotta let it go. It'll eat you alive if you don't.”

  “Yeah, maybe.” Early patted Thel's hand. He drew her around, and she sat beside him on the bench seat. Early pushed his plate to her. “ ’Fraid I don't have much of an appetite.”

  “Me neither,” Thelma said. “Maybe if it dries some, I'll go for a walk. Friendly Neighbor said it's going to be a good day. I need to be outside.”

  “And I need to be in the office. Paperwork on this one's going to be horrendous.”

  “Then you better eat something, Jimmy.”

  “A bite maybe.” Early poked his fork at the scrambled eggs.

  “Dammit, Cactus, he murdered my deputy. I want him prosecuted for that.” Spade-bearded Clay County Sheriff Art Smith banged around Early's office while Early, leaning forward, worked the blade of his pocketknife across a whetstone. He turned the blade with each stroke, honing its edge to a scalpel-like sharpness. Hutch Tolliver lounged in the corner, and County Attorney Carl Wieland fanned himself with a folder of papers.

  “Not going to happen, sheriff,” Wieland said, aiming his folder at Smith, “not just yet. We're going to take the cases in the order the crimes were committed.”

  “But if you get a conviction on that teacher's murder—”

  “And we will.”

  “—Smitts is going to be executed before you get him to court for my deputy's murder.”

  Early raised a finger.

  “Cactus?” Wieland asked.

  “How about this? Ask the judge to delay sentencing until after the second trial. You can run the trial in on the next week or even the next day. We're all set to go.”

  “Except for the murder weapon. You don't have a murder weapon for either case, and old Bill isn't going to tell us where they are.”

  Smith whipped around to Early. “Is that right?”

  Early studied the edge on his blade. With it, he shaved a few hairs from the back of his hand. “Now, boys, this is one sharp knife,” he said and folded the blade into its handle. “Art, the gun Bill had didn't kill your deputy. Wrong caliber.”

  Smith swept off his hat and knuckle rubbed his scalp. “Jimmy, I thought you were better than this.”

  “The gun's got to be out there somewhere. I've got a constable and three deputies out searching the ditches and the ravines. Hutch and I are going out, and you're welcome to come along.”

  “Damn right I'm coming.”

  Mose Dickerson pulled against sumac bushes as he worked his way up the side of a steep ravine toward where Early and Sheriff Smith stood, Smith chewing snuff with the ferocity of an angered bull, Early with his hands thrust in his back pockets.

  “That's his car,” Dickerson said. “Rain washed out his track ’cept where the car went over. If I hadn't come on that, I'da never gone down there. He threw brush over the car so you couldn't see it from up here.”

  “A gun?” Early asked.

  Dickerson shook his head. “Foller me,” he said and hopstepped out into the pasture.

  Fifty yards on, the three stopped at the edge of a pond, the bank around it well churned by the hooves of cows rambling down into the water to drink.

  “This is on a straight line from the ravine to the road,” Dickerson said, first pointing in one direction, then the other. “If I'm Bill and I'm wantin’ to get rid of a gun, I'd throw it in that pond. Muddy bottom like it's got to have, nobody's ever going to find it.”

  Early pulled off his cattleman's hat. He raked his fingers back through his hair before he resettled his hat. He glanced at Smith. “Art, he's right.”

  “Look,” Smith said, “I could get a pump out here tomorrow morning with a gas engine. We could pump that sucker dry.”

  “Except for the mud.”

  “Still and all, there's a chance we might see the gun with the water out of there.”

  “Always a chance.”

  “Eight o'clock then?”

  “You want to do it,” Early said, “we'll be here.”

  Early had had enough. He sent his deputies and Dickerson home, called dispatch with the message that he was going out of service, and drove away for the Rocking Horse E.

  Rotten day.

  Just one damn, awful rotten day.

  The only thing that saved it, and Early was certain of it, was the rain that had come the day before. The rain slaked the thirst of the bluestem pastures and brought a hint of green, the beginnings of new growth. The ranchers in the area might go into the winter with enough grass to help carry their cattle through. And if winter brought enough snow and spring enough rain, next year might be decent. Herds moved to Nebraska would come home to the Flint Hills. Walter Estes hadn't had to ship his. He had a creek pasture and hay that he scrounged from neighbors who'd shipped their cattle north. He hadn't had to draw on his winter feed, and Early felt relief for that.

  He rambled his way along the lane toward the ranchstead, his mind on ranching, a far more pleasurable subject than the murders of a schoolteacher and a deputy—one killer for both and he was in jail, but convictions in doubt because, well, the damn weapons. Where were they?
/>   Early made the turn around the barn, toward the grove of cottonwoods and the house. Before he stopped, Nadine Estes, in her bib overalls, came running.

  “Jimmy, Thelma's gone!”

  Early bailed from the Jeep. “When?”

  “An hour ago maybe. I was working in the kitchen, not even thinking about her.”

  Early glanced around. “Any of the horses gone?”

  “No.”

  “Walter?”

  “He took his truck. He's out on the road, thinks she may have walked to Leonardville.”

  “Archie?”

  “The dog? I've not seen him.”

  “He with Walter?”

  “No.”

  “Then he's with Thel. They've gotten to be best buddies, so she's all right.”

  “But where is she, Jimmy?”

  “She goes for walks when I'm not here. Where does she like to walk best?”

  “Of course, the creek pasture.”

  “Damn, that's a mile. Into the Jeep.”

  Nadine Estes hurried as fast as her elderly legs would carry her to the passenger side of Early's Jeep and horsed herself into the seat. Early popped the clutch when he hit the driver's seat. He spun the steering wheel, whipping his vehicle into a turn that aimed it north, away from the buildings and out through a pasture, the grass stubby, the land flat. He stepped the accelerator to the floor, and the war machine responded.

  Nadine Estes, one hand gripped tight to the seat frame, the other braced against the dash, yelled over the whine of the motor and the wind, “Walter never drives this fast.”

  “This too much for you?”

  “No, kind of a thrill.”

  Early held the speed until a fence line appeared on the horizon. He aimed the Jeep for a gate that hung open, shot through, and slowed as the ground beyond fell away toward Worrisome Creek ambling through the pasture on its way to the Big Blue River to the east.

  “There.” Early pointed to the side, toward a lone cottonwood, a giant growing in the bottomland, a gaggle of cattle lounging in the tree's shade. He wrenched the Jeep in the new direction, toward someone and a smaller black form meandering through grass long enough to brush the underside of the Jeep.

  Nadine Estes took her hand from the seat. She poked Early. “That's Thelma all right, and Archie. You're not gonna run them over, are you?”

  At that, he swung the Jeep wide, took his foot off the accelerator. He veered to the side of Thelma and the dog, neither of whom appeared to be aware that they had company, then wheeled across in front of them.

  The dog let out one loud bark. He twisted back to Thelma who stood mute, shading her eyes with her forearm. When no response came from her, the dog raced off toward the Jeep.

  Early idled in closer to Thelma. “Hi-dee,” he said.

  “Hi-dee.”

  “You all right?”

  “Just walking with Archie. Soppy, my shoes are wet as wool in rain. Why are you here?”

  “Nadine didn't know where you were, so we came looking.”

  “Oh.”

  “You want to go with us to the house?”

  “If I can drive, Jimmy. You never let me drive anymore.”

  Early glanced at Nadine Estes who mouthed the words “Why not?”

  He stepped out of the Jeep. “Sure, there's nothing for you to run into out here.”

  A smile, so welcome to Early, came to Thelma's face. She ensconced herself in the driver's seat while he stepped up on a rear tire and into the back. He slapped the seat beside him, motioning for the dog to jump in, and slapped the seat again when the dog didn't.

  Archie, a Newfoundland the size of a small horse, gave Early a perplexed look.

  “He's not a jumper, Jimmy,” Nadine Estes said.

  “You mean I have to—”

  “Yes.”

  Early grimaced. He hopped over the side, his gaze locked on the dog. Early patted his leg. “Come on, Arch.”

  That brought a ruckus of tail wagging as Archie wandered in. Early scooped him up. He staggered under the dog's weight as he made his way to the side of the Jeep. Just as Early hefted the dog up—higher—to go over the side, he stepped in a pile of cow manure. Early's boot slid out from under him. A yelp, followed by a wild dance, and Early came down on his back, Archie across his chest, unconcerned. He licked Early's face.

  Nadine Estes and Thelma bolted out of the Jeep. They came hustling to Early, Thelma going down on her knees. “You all right?” she asked.

  “Me or Arch?”

  “I can see he's all right. Are you?”

  “Aside from what I fell in and dog spit on my face?” Early gazed at a cloud drifting overhead, a meager thing and the first to have appeared since the storms of yesterday. “You know, the sky's kinda nice, looking up at it like this.”

  “Jimmy—”

  Nadine Estes grabbed the dog's collar. She hauled him off Early and to her side of the Jeep. There she gestured for Archie to hop in, and the dog clambered up. He squeezed between the front seats to the backseat and settled himself, ears up, looking eager for the ride ahead.

  Thelma helped Early to his feet. She glanced at his backside as he came up. “Jimmy, you're going to need some clean clothes.”

  “I guessed that.”

  “And you smell, too.”

  “You make me feel so good.” Early shooed the dog to one side of the backseat. Again he stepped up on a rear tire and inside. After Early sat, he put his arm around the dog. “Pooch, you are a trial.”

  The dog swiveled his head, bathing the side of Early's face with his wet, raspy tongue, Early scrunching up.

  Thelma, in the driver's seat, pulled hard on the floor shifter.

  That set off a clashing of gears. And Early's face twisted into the sourest of expressions, as if he had sucked on a lime. “No no, you gotta step the clutch all the way to the floor,” he said, pressing a hand against his ear, to block out the racket.

  “The seat's too far back.”

  “Well, slide it forward.”

  “I can do that?”

  “Yes. Pull up on the lever under your left leg.”

  Thelma glanced down. She felt for the flap-shaped piece of metal, found it, and pulled up, and Early pushed the seat forward.

  “Oh, that's so much better,” Thelma said as the seat locked into its new place. She stepped on the clutch, and the gears meshed. Thelma let out the clutch and at the same instant stepped down on the gas. The Jeep bolted off, startling the dog, Early, and Nadine Estes, Early grabbing for his hat.

  Thelma let off on the gas pedal, pitching everyone forward. Then she disengaged the clutch, slammed the shifter into second, and tromped hard on the accelerator, snapping everyone back.

  “Thelma!”

  “Something wrong?” she asked as she jerked the vehicle into third.

  “It's not a bucking horse.”

  “What?”

  “The fence, THE FENCE—”

  Thelma's mouth gaped open. She whipped the Jeep to the side, shot it through the open gate, the motor howling, the Jeep's speed increasing.

  Early sucked wind at the sight of a dip ahead. But before he could form a word of protest, the Jeep whammed into the dip and out, the machine going airborne. It slammed down hard and raced on, devouring the distance between it and the ranch buildings.

  “Thel, slow up!”

  “Am I going too fast?”

  “Dammit, yes!”

  She did a dance with her feet, coming off the gas, stepping on the brake and the clutch at the same time, flinging everyone forward. Her shifting hand whipped the transmission into second gear, and the Jeep racked down more, to a saunter. Thelma steered past the corral and toward a wash line in the yard by the house, the wash line where half a dozen pairs of Levis and an equal number of blue work shirts hung slack in the still afternoon air.

  “Wasn't that fun?” she asked as she stopped the Jeep.

  Thelma didn't have to turn around. Early heard the absolute joy in her voice and
knew the warmth of the smile that would be on her face. Could he be truthful and say that was damned awful?

  “Fun?” Early asked. “I guess.”

  He clambered over the side. The dog hopped over the other side of the Jeep, and Nadine Estes came away from the passenger seat. “Fresh clothes there on the line,” she said. “I'll get a bucket of water so you can wash out the backseat.”

  Early stopped. “Me?”

  “You were the one who sat back there, Jimmy. If it had been me, I woulda walked home.”

  Early burst out laughing.

  “What's so funny?”

  “If it had been you and Walter out there, you would have walked home to keep the seat in Walter's truck clean?”

  “Absolutely I would have done that.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Early said.

  Nadine Estes went on to the house and Early to the wash line, still sniggering over the thought as he shucked his shirt. Behind him the radio came on in his Jeep. “It's four thirty-five in the PM on your Friendly Neighbor,” a voice said. “And now I'll play a Red Foley record for you, ‘The Grass Green Hills of Home.’ ”

  That was a new one to Early. He didn't recognize the melody. He pitched aside his shirt, pulled off one boot, then the other, and stripped himself out of his stinking, manure-greased pants. Early took a fresh pair down from the line. He stepped into them, glancing as he did at Thelma still in the Jeep. He buttoned the fly. “You gonna shut it down and get out?”

  “Just want to listen to this. . . . It was fun driving, wasn't it?”

  Early transferred his stuff from the pockets of his filthy jeans to the pockets of the clean ones. He leaned against the wash line post and, when he reached down for one of his boots, saw from the corner of his eye Walter Estes's International rambling along the lane coming from the county highway. Early pulled on one boot and then the other as the truck came around the barn, Estes waving his hat out the side window. Early took down a clean shirt. He thrust an arm into a sleeve and went toward the Jeep and Estes's truck.

  The Jeep rolled. It rambled, then shot away, Estes swerving to the side as Thelma and the Jeep passed by within a hand's distance, Early running, his shirt and its empty sleeve streaming behind him. He bellowed, “Walter, I want your truck.”