If Catfish Had Nine Lives (Country Cooking School Mystery) (5 page)

Though I was becoming anxious to find Gram again, and Joe, and change out of my overalls, my plans were diverted, but at least it was by someone I wanted to talk to. Orly signaled to me as he steered his big old pickup truck down a side street at the end of the boardwalk.

“Miss Winston,” he said after he stopped the truck and reached over to open the passenger door with a push on some extra squeaky hinges. “You have a minute?”

I’d only known Orly for a few days, but our relationship had been built on things that either bring people together quickly or not. We’d chatted as we were setting up a mess hall of sorts, while unfolding some cots and transporting cooking utensils. I’d learned that he was born in Hutchinson, Kansas, and had lived there all his life, minus a brief time in Tennessee and a “little-more-than-brief” stint in Georgia. His love of Kansas, specifically the small town of Hutchinson, was, frankly, kind of cute. There were a lot of small towns in the Midwest, and most of them were populated with a healthy number of people whose goal was to leave small-town life behind and move to a big city. Not Orly, though. He was, in his own words, “as deep into Kansas dirt as all that wheat.”

He’d been married once, but his wife had died about ten years earlier. He had two daughters, only one of whom, so far, had given him a grandson to dote on. He said he’d be happy with a whole herd of grandbabies to spoil rotten. His use of the word “herd” could probably be attributed to the fact that he was also a cattleman back in Hutchinson, with a “smallish” ranch. I hadn’t been privileged to hear one of his poems yet, but he told me that his cattle and the cattleman’s life were his biggest writing inspirations.

I’d liked him immediately, even though I’d sensed that he wasn’t comfortable with welcoming new friends into his life. Despite the fact that he was the president of the International Cowboy Poetry Association and had been involved with it for twenty-five years, in positions that required a multitude of communication skills, it was evident that he purposefully kept things close to the vest. Scratch that—close to the very Western-style vest. He was silent and observant much more than he was talkative. He also gave the impression that he was efficient in everything he did. No matter what task he was attending to, there were no wasted movements, no backtracking, no repeating. He was one of those people who probably
was
good at everything.

And he and I had not only hit it off well, but quickly, too. We’d been able to work together without needing to discuss much—we knew what had to be done and somehow we both knew what abilities we could each contribute, so we made a good team. This had begun the day before the poets even came to town. Since our initial connection, Orly had sought me out when something needed doing. I’d become his sidekick of sorts, and though I hadn’t expected such responsibility, I had enjoyed it.

However, I didn’t really know him. And there’d been a murder. And he was asking me to get into his truck.

“Sure, but Gram is probably wondering where I am. Let me text her that I’ll be with you for the next little bit.”

“Thanks.”

The truck’s engine revved a little rich as Orly waited patiently. I sensed that I was overreacting and being silly, but sending the text seemed like a smart and harmless move.

“Okay, what’s up?” I asked after I hit send, and then hoisted myself onto the passenger side of the bench seat.

“I want to show you something at the campsite.”

“Okay.”

“Good.”

Both my parents work at Broken Rope High School. My dad is the principal and my mom is the auto shop teacher, so even long after finishing high school I still spent plenty of time in the building, where the typical scents of floor cleaner and Tater Tots greeted visitors each time they walked through the front doors.

The high school had been built in the late 1800s, but the powers that had been had decided to forgo the typical brick building design of most American high schools of the time. Instead, Broken Rope High School resembled the Alamo. Jake knew the whole story much better than I did, but someone on the town’s planning commission thought Spanish baroque would be an interesting design for the building that sat on the edge of town and served not only residents of Broken Rope but also those from other small towns throughout the county. It was wide, one story, the front facade rising with an ornate rounded peak in the middle above the front doors. The front lawn was also wide, and mostly tree-filled, giving the entire setting some terrific curb appeal.

The timing of spring break had been helpful when it came to scheduling the convention. Gram had always scheduled the cooking school’s break at the same time as the rest of the area schools’, so fortunately we’d both been available to help, and the high school was also void of students, who couldn’t wait to get as far away from there as they could for a week. School staff were still working if they wanted to; very few wanted to, though, so there was little traffic to be disturbed by the influx of visitors who camped in the big field behind the school.

The field had been deemed a perfect setup for the poets. It sat beyond the school building, a soccer field, and a football stadium. Another structure stood at one far corner of the field; a big shed had been constructed and placed there only a couple months earlier for the school district to use as a storage facility. Though the walls of the shed were made of aluminum, my dad had asked for a design that wasn’t as cold and utilitarian as a typical storage shed. The district had built a big red aluminum barn. It wasn’t exactly what Dad had had in mind, but he’d decided to like it. It wasn’t all that bad, and it sat back far enough that you could only see it once you got past the football stadium.

At the other corner of the campsite, a good fifty yards away, and across what used to be a heavily used stagecoach trail—if you looked hard or just happened to catch one with your toe, you could still find wheel ruts in the mostly overgrown ground—sat the reproduced Pony Express station. The stable in St. Joseph was different than our station; different than any of the reproduced stations through the western United States. The stable in St. Joseph was bigger and had housed more horses and men than the smaller, more simply built stations. Our station was ramped up with a little extra technology and a real door, which I’d heard wasn’t typical of most of the other modern incarnations. Also, in our station, small podiums with plaques telling the story of the Pony Express lined three of the four inside walls. Electricity had been added so that track lighting attached to the wooden ceiling beams could be used to illuminate the plaques. Jake had told me that a solid door had been needed to protect the modern-day additions, but that the typical station back in the day didn’t have a door, just a large opening. Behind the station was more Missouri woods—lots and lots of Missouri woods.

Orly turned the truck onto the road next to the school, steering us past the adobe structure.

“I found something, and I wanted you to see it,” he said. He hadn’t had much to say since we’d left Main Street, but I’d asked him if he was okay, considering the brutal turn of the morning. He assured me that he was fine, though understandably shaken up. He asked me the same question. I promised him I’d be okay, too. He also noted that no matter what the reality was, and even though the police had questioned everyone, it might not have soaked in totally with convention attendees that what they’d seen had been real and as awful as anything could be. There might be more trauma to come for some. I didn’t know what I could do to help with that, but I decided I’d talk to Cliff about it later.

“What did you find?” I asked.

“I’ll show you when we get there. You can tell me if you think I should show it to the police.”

I blinked as the gears in my head starting spinning up to full throttle. “Wait, Orly, is this something that has to do with the murder?”

He shrugged. “Maybe.”

I sat up straighter. “I think you should definitely show it to the police, then.”

“I’d like you to see it first.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know who to trust, ’cept for you, your gram, and that Jake fella.”

“You can trust the police. They’re the best.”

“Maybe, but this place—Broken Rope—has quite a reputation. I just dunno.”

“I promise. They can be trusted. Do you want me to call them?” I fished my phone out of my overalls pocket.

“Hang on. We’re almost there. You look at it first and then we’ll call them if you think it’s necessary. If you say it’s okay to trust them, then I will, but like I said, we’re almost there.”

I was silent, a million questions and scary scenarios going through my mind.

Orly glanced over at me. “It’s nothing to worry about. I just want you to see it.”

I nodded without looking at him.

When we passed the football stadium and I could get an even better look at the campsite, my discomfort got replaced by surprise.

“More people came today?” I said, noticing the larger number of tents and campers.

“Sure. Not everybody likes all the early events, but everyone loves the late nights; the party. Lots of the new arrivals weren’t even at the show this morning. I had a good chat with Jim, that police fella, about keeping things moving along. He thought the rest of the convention should be canceled, but I told him lots of people were still on their way and letting all of them know about any change of plans would be impossible. I don’t think he wanted to let us go on, but he did. And here we all are.”

I suspected that was why Orly didn’t
trust
the police.

“Should Gram and I continue to plan on the Dutch oven and fish frying demonstrations tomorrow?”

“Absolutely.”

The culmination of the cowboy poetry convention was a huge dinner, with most of the food cooked outside over campfires. The finalists for the poetry contests were announced, the poems read and voted upon (the volume of whoops and hollers was used to tally votes, Orly had told me), and prizes doled out. The rest of the evening, and most of the night (again, from what Orly had told me), was spent in celebration. A band that was heavy on fiddle and banjo music would play, and people would dance and sing and probably drink too much. No one was allowed to drive any sort of vehicle anywhere until they were cleared as ready and able and sober the next day.

I knew there were restrictions on the placement and the number of campfires that could be active at the campsite. Only two fires were allowed, and they had to be placed on opposite sides of the site, as well as a certain distance from any of the camping structures—the tents and trailers. We’d be able to do the fish fry at the campsite, but the number of fires needed for the Dutch oven demonstrations dictated that we do those somewhere else. We decided the cooking school parking lot would be perfect. It was a place that could safely handle the fire and heat of a number of cooking stations without much concern for a spark hitting the neighboring woods or school structure. Evan, the fire marshal, had assured us that representatives from the fire department would be on-site to monitor and help with any issues. The fire restrictions were obviously being respected, but I wondered if there was a law regarding restrictions on the number of campers allowed on an open field behind a high school. Even if there wasn’t a law, it was clear that there were just too many people in one space, too many tents, and campers, too. I didn’t know the exact dangers that went along with poor crowd management, but I was sure that Jim was losing his mind regarding the campsite, and even more so with a murder. I suspected he hadn’t just shut everything down because he still wanted to investigate, and if the convention were shut down, people would just leave. He didn’t want anyone to leave yet. I didn’t envy the position he’d been put in.

Orly steered the truck to the far end of the field, to the back corner that was almost directly across the old stagecoach tracks from the Express station. He’d set up his tent on a corner patch, where anyone who might need him could find him easily.

He parked and said, “In my tent.”

“Orly, you need to tell me what’s in there. I’m concerned, and I don’t know if I want to see what you think I need to see.”

He chewed on the inside of his cheek a second and then said, “Well, I got you this far, so I guess it’s okay to tell you now that there’s a fella inside my tent. He asked me specifically to come find you and get you out here without telling you what was going on first. He thought you’d be so upset or concerned that you wouldn’t come alone, and he didn’t want anyone but you here.”

“What fella? Who?”

“Claims to be your brother. I already told him that I’d shoot him if he’s lying or tries anything funny.”

I was suddenly wedged in between shock and humor; shocked that Teddy might be in Orly’s tent, humor because of Orly’s dry delivery of his threat; but then I realized he meant what he was saying. Teddy really was in his tent, and Orly probably truly would shoot him if he deemed it necessary.

“Oh, no,” I said. “What’d he get himself into this time?”

“Your question makes me think he’s exactly the type of young man I suspected him to be. Should we go see?”