by Bill Hopkins
Chapter 13
Last Wednesday Night
After Gustave dismissed them, Ollie and Rosswell drove to town. They stopped in front of Mabel's Eatery to sit in the truck under a street lamp, which buzzed and crackled, awakening from its daylong sleep.
"Judge, come in for supper. It's filet mignon night."
"I'm not hungry."
"You're not hungry?" Ollie gawked at Rosswell. "Are you sick? I mean, besides..." Ollie examined his fingernails, then rubbed the tattoo on his bald head while he peered through the passenger window.
"It's okay to say besides the leukemia." Rosswell studied the Church of Sainte Genevieve, the patron saint of Paris. "I'm tired. I need to go back to The Four Bee and sleep." Maybe he'd dream of being in the City of Light at the top of the Eiffel Tower, ready to jump.
"Go to bed?" Ollie checked his watch. "The sun won't set for awhile."
Rosswell watched what looked like an egg yolk sinking into a pool of blood.
There was concern in Ollie's voice when he said, "Haven't you been sleeping?"
"I fall asleep for an hour, maybe two. Then I have a nightmare. I wake up sweating. I don't fall back to sleep. Happens about every night."
"Sleep paralysis."
Rosswell had never heard the term. "What's that?"
"It happens as you're falling asleep or waking up. You can't move. Your muscles are weak. You can have hallucinations."
"Hallucinations without booze? Or dope? Without fever?"
"Hypnagogia is what it's called. Healthy people can be affected, especially when you're so tired you can't function. Doctors write about it in medical journals all the time."
Rosswell remembered something about the episodes. "Someone's chasing me."
"Have you been caught yet? I mean, in your dream."
"No." Rosswell closed his eyes. The fatigue clutched him, drawing him closer to exhaustion. "Last night I dreamed I was hanging upside down in a tree by one foot."
"Typical."
Rosswell opened his eyes and tapped rapidly on the steering wheel. "Typical of what?" He wasn't sure he wanted to hear the answer.
"It's a Tarot card. The Hanged Man is suspended upside down by one foot between heaven and earth, between spirituality and materialism. Like Absalom, King David's son, caught by the hair of his head in a huge oak tree. Between heaven and earth."
"To borrow your favorite phrase, unadulterated bullshit. Hanging between heaven and earth isn't going to help me sleep."
Ollie rubbed his head again. "Tried sleeping pills? Chamomile tea? Hot milk?"
"I always carry three tablets each of antacid, pain killer, antihistamine, and sleeping pill." Rosswell pulled a green bottle from his pocket. "I've tried everything."
"Everything?"
"Everything but booze, if that's what you're asking." The bottle disappeared into his pocket. "Anyway, the doctor told me that the effects of the chemo could last for six months or a year. Nothing drastic, but I'd feel rundown occasionally. No big deal."
Rosswell had never told Tina, much less Ollie, about the black dog of depression licking at his heels. Such a revelation would serve no purpose, although Rosswell suspected both of them had already recognized his dilemma, growing like a thorn tree in a field of daisies. Why was he ashamed of his mental problem? Lots of people were afflicted with depression and didn't try to keep it secret.
Winston Churchill publicly recognized the danger of the dog. Rosswell had memorized a passage from the prime minister's writings: "I don't like standing near the edge of a platform when an express train is passing through. I like to stand right back and if possible get a pillar between me and the train. A second's action would end everything."
Even though Etta James, the blues singer who suffered from heroin addiction and leukemia, lasted until age seventy-three, Rosswell concluded that he wouldn't be as lucky. He had every reason to be depressed. He'd killed a little girl in the war. He'd killed Johnny Dan Dumey. Tina was gone, maybe dead. Maybe his child was dead. He'd seen a body thrown into the river. The sheriff was-he had to face it-roadblocking him. And, as an extra bonus, he'd fallen on top of a corpse decorated with a note in which some unknown bad guy-Nathaniel Dahlbert?-threatened his life.
"Ollie, I'll be through with court tomorrow morning around ten-thirty or eleven. We need to talk about this some more."
"Talk about what?"
"The case."
Ollie ripped out his famous squeak. "There's no case. You heard Sheriff Fribeau."
"And when did you start believing Fribeau? Don't you believe I saw a woman thrown into the river?"
"Never and yes."
"What?"
Ollie exhaled loudly. "I don't believe the sheriff. I do believe you."
"Then there's a case."
"Not if you and I are the only ones who believe you."
"Ollie, what are you saying?"
"I'm resigning as your research assistant. I'm trying to become a respectable businessman in Sainte Gen and riling the law is the last thing I want to do."
Rosswell didn't answer. Ollie's desire not to draw the attention of the cops was sound reasoning. There was no way to argue that. Probationers should always be respectful to the law. And, when probationers break the law, they should do it in private and not tell anyone.
"Rosswell, did you hear me?"
"Yes, I heard you. Well?have a good night."
"Forget what I said about the trust fund for my grandkid."
"Wow!"
"Don't act so surprised," Ollie said. "I'm not taking your money, even if it is for my grandkid. I'm not a thief."
"Turn around. See what beauty arrives." Rosswell pointed to Jasmine LaFaire dallying toward them. Her gait was a lingering stroll. "Here comes the deck hand. Maybe you'll have a better night without me."
Ollie straightened to his full height. "She walks nice."
"I love the silver tips on her hair. That goes good with your purple tattoo."
Jasmine arrived at the passenger side of the truck. "Judge. Ollie. You all having a private conversation?" Instead of motor oil, now Jasmine carried a lemony scent about her. Her bulky overalls had been replaced with skintight jeans and a pink peasant blouse, accenting her curves.
Impressed with her transformation from a manual laborer to a beautiful woman, Rosswell's tongue stilled, unable to receive signals from his brain.
Ollie said, "We were trying to decide the style of architecture for the church. Judge says it's Late Romanesque but I'm tending toward Modified French Gothic. What do you think?"
Jasmine glimpsed at the church, then spoke to Ollie. "I've been thinking about something. Lots of things, in fact."
Rosswell said, "Maybe Renaissance?"
"Both of you may think you're fooling my dad and the sheriff and everyone else in the county, but not me. You all are playing detective because you don't like the way the cops are handling this. Anyway, Judge, you asked me if I saw the men on the boat do anything suspicious."
Ollie said, "Actually, it was me who asked you that."
Rosswell elbowed Ollie in the ribs. "We're listening."
"I got to thinking about what happened the other morning. Something funny about Turk."
Rosswell glared Ollie into silence when he started to comment.
She continued, "I think Turk is selling dope."
Ollie said, "You and everyone else in a hundred mile radius think that."
Rosswell said, "Is that what you thought was odd about Turk?"
"No. I've got to keep my eye on everything when we're on the river so I don't have much time to watch the passengers. But there was one thing that didn't strike me odd till I thought about it later. I saw Turk give Charlie money. Then Charlie gave something to Turk."
Rosswell said, "Maybe Charlie is one of Turk's suppliers. Turk's stock is getting low and he was replenishing his inventory."
"Maybe," Jasmine said. "But what Charlie handed Turk wasn't dope. It was a post office envelope. One of those big ones. Legal size. Sea
led up from what I could tell."
Ollie said, "You can put lots of dope in one of those envelopes."
Jasmine said, "Sure, but this one was flat and thick. It looked like a file was in there."
"A file?" Rosswell said. "How can you tell what's in a sealed envelope?"
"I mean, it looked like what I send off to the government. You wouldn't believe the paper work I have to fill out. Charlie gave Turk a file."
Jasmine joined Ollie for supper. Rosswell stayed in the truck under the streetlight, reading about Nathaniel Dahlbert's house in the history book he'd bought at the antique store.
River Heights Villa had been built shortly before the Civil War. The wannabe Renaissance style called Italianate was in vogue at that time. Among other things, the architecture of that day featured towers stuck here and there. The grayish limestone building sported two of the towers, about six stories high, on the north and south ends of the house. Rumor had it that the Confederates in Missouri used the towers to spy on Federal activity in Illinois and on the Mississippi River during the War Between the States.
Rosswell thought the towers would make good observation posts. A guard posted up top could see the roads, the railroad tracks, and the river traffic. River Heights Villa would make a great place for a secret operation.
But what kind of operation?
