Bootlegger’s Daughter (28 page)

DM: Yes.

DB: So who killed him, McCloy?

DM: I don’t know. Honest.

At this point, Baby Bird Jamison returned with a bag of hamburgers, fries, and four chocolate shakes. Denn wasn’t hungry and merely picked at his, but just the aroma made me shaky. It’d been nearly twelve hours since I’d had anything more than a stale Nabs cracker I’d found in the bottom of my purse before locking it in my trunk. I was so ravenous that I’d gobbled down all my fries and was ready to start on Denn’s when Dwight remembered the missing panel.

“Why do you think Michael took it down, and where is it now?” he asked.

Again Denn shook his head. “I just can’t figure it.”

He unwrapped his hamburger and began feeding it to Lily, who acted almost as hungry as me. When she’d finished it, he leaned back wearily in the golden chair. “I’m dead.”

That brought an ironic smile to his lips. “Look, could we please call it a day? Any minute now, all my systems are going to crash.” He took a deep breath. “And tomorrow doesn’t look to be any easier.”

Dwight looked as disappointed as any man with a mouthful of dill pickle could manage. “I was hoping I could get you to draw me a picture of what that panel looked like. The Holy Ghost, I believe you told Deb’rah?”

Denn yawned without bothering to hide it. “Yeah. A dove and some lilies. Can’t it wait till tomorrow?”

“Okay,” Dwight said. “You want Deputy Jamison to run you back?”

“No,” he answered wearily. “I’ll be okay. Come on, Lily. Let’s go home.”

Jack Jamison looked after them so longingly that Dwight took pity on him, too.

“The Pot Shot’s on your way home, isn’t it?”

“Yes, sir,” said Jamison.

“Well, if Miss Knott here will drop me off in Dobbs-”

“Consider yourself dropped,” I said.

“You can head on home then,” said Dwight. “Just follow along behind McCloy and see he doesn’t run off the road.”

We munched in companionable silence for a few minutes after we heard the two vehicles drive off, then Dwight said, “Oh, damn!”

“What?”

“I never asked him what he was looking for in amongst the costumes.”

I finished my hamburger and walked over to the racks. “You reckon it was Michael’s panel?”

I hitched up the dust sheet and started flipping through the costumes one by one. “It would be easy to slip a piece of fabric like that on one of the hangers, wouldn’t it?”

Interested, Dwight pulled a chair over and started working through the upper rack from the other end.

It took longer than I thought it would since some hangers held two garments, one inside the other. We passed each other in the middle and, after about ten minutes, had reached the ends of our respective racks without finding the panel.

I glanced up and saw Dwight with his hand on red velvet. “My cloak,” I said.

“Huh?”

“Denn’s going to give me that cloak soon as the next production’s finished. Isn’t it gorgeous? Hand it down a minute.”

He lifted it off the rack, hanger and all. “Thing weighs a ton.”

“Why do you think Victorian women were called the weaker sex?” I said. “They must have been worn out before they began, just lugging that much cloth around on their bodies all day. No wonder they were always fainting.”

“I always thought it was those whalebone corsets.”

I undid the clasp to free the hanger and then realized there was another garment underneath.

One that was stiff and red and shiny.

“Oh my God!”

“What?” Alarmed by my tone, Dwight quickly stepped down from the chair and came to me. “What is it?”

“Janie’s raincoat,” I whispered. “The one she was wearing the day she disappeared.”

Dwight had read through the files on Janie Whitehead’s death when he took over the detective division at the sheriff’s department, but he’d been in the army both when she died and when the SBI reworked the case seven years ago. Even if he’d been here, the SBI wouldn’t have let him read their files, so I had to explain the significance of Janie’s slicker.

By this time, I was getting a little confused myself. “What makes it crazy is that Howard Grimes was so right about seeing Janie wearing this, yet got it mixed up about where they were parked.”

“Howard Grimes… he any kin to Amos and Petey Grimes?”

I wasn’t sure. “Their uncle, maybe?”

Dwight shook his head. “Their daddy’s the only one I knew. Howard Grimes. He died a few years back, didn’t he?”

“Yes, just about the time the SBI reworked the murder. I asked Dr. Vickery about him last week and he said Grimes really did have a bad heart.”

Even as we talked about him, we were both being real careful not to touch the slicker Howard Grimes had described any more than we could help. Such a shiny surface would hold fingerprints. Dwight lifted off the heavy cloak and I hung the coat, still on its hanger, on a nearby hook.

It was cheaply made and unlined. Slick red vinyl backed with some sort of white cheesecloth to give it shape. Dwight was interested in an ugly brown splotch on the inside and he used the eraser ends of two pencils to hold the front open.

“No fold marks,” I said.

“Hmm?”

“If this had been folded up in a box for eighteen years, it’d have deep creases. It’s already starting to have some from being squashed inside the cloak. See?” It was an A-line garment and I pointed to some longitudinal folds where the skirt part had been constricted. “But look at the shoulders. That’s odd. Permanent wrinkles across the upper sleeves?”

Dwight stepped back and watched as I lifted a sleeve with his pencil until it was extended straight out horizontally from the shoulder. The wrinkles fell into place naturally.

“It was stored flat?” Dwight asked.

Despite the warm evening, I felt the hair on my arms stand up. “You could say that. I bet if you turn the hanger around though, you’d see a deep little dent at each elbow.”

Dwight reached out and turned it.

I was right.

“Picture this hanging on a wall,” I told him, “with a three-foot oak dowel running through the sleeves to hold them out, and the dowel resting on two pegs. It would look like a cross, wouldn’t it?”

“Crimson as the blood of Christ,” he said. “Splashed with Janie Whitehead’s blood. Jesus! Was he crazy?”

“Define crazy,” I said, feeling infinitely weary. “Only north-northwest, probably. Every time I ever saw him, he could tell a hawk from a handsaw.”

Dwight smiled. “Tired?”

“A little. What time is it?” I looked at my watch. Not yet midnight. It felt much later. “I guess it’s too late to call Terry Wilson?”

He scowled.

“Don’t be like that,” I said. “You know you’re going to have to sooner or later. Scotty Underhill, too.”

“Yeah, I know. I guess I was thinking it might be nice to let the Vickerys get their son buried before we tell everybody he was a killer.” He went back to the table and sat down on the edge with his milkshake. “Still got a lot of unanswered questions. Who killed Michael? Why’d he bring the raincoat over here and hide it?”

“That wasn’t Michael, that was Denn.”

“How do you figure?”

“Because when I thought it was a tapestry panel missing, he very obligingly made up a dove and some lilies, remember?”

“Oh, yeah.”

He held out his empty cup as I uncapped the chocolate milkshake Denn hadn’t touched. I poured him half and took the rest for myself. Most of the ice cream had melted, but it was still cool and sweet on the tongue.

“There must have been a spare key to Michael’s room, so when Denn called me, he knew he was going to bring the slicker as proof. And I bet he stopped off here first on his way to Raleigh because he wouldn’t have wanted his friend to see it.”

“Makes sense.” Dwight slurped his straw and tossed the cardboard cup into the wastebasket. “Three points,” he crowed, and I saw a lanky teenager in his grin.

“Two,” I said. “Your foot was inside the circle.”

He stood and stretched with his hands clasped over his head so that the thin fabric of his summer jacket tightened across his chest. Then he shook himself out and finished summing up.

“So Michael goes upstairs, suddenly realizes the thing’s missing. He can see his whole life hitting the fan. He might not know where Denn’s gone with his truck, but Cathy King’s told him where he’s going to be at nine o’clock. And who’s McCloy planning to meet? The same little ol’ busybody lawyer who’s been poking around about Janie Whitehead’s murder.”

“Michael lied to Denn about the mill, you know. Will and Seth did meet him at the end of the lane that morning.” I was suddenly sobered. “Was I a catalyst, Dwight? Did I cause somebody else to figure it out first and is that why Michael was killed?”

“You can’t start second-guessing everything you do, shug,” he said. “Anyhow, Janie’s got no brothers to avenge her and her daddy’s dead. ’Course Jed’s still living.”

And Will, I thought.

And who knew who else might’ve had reason?

“Doesn’t have to be a man,” I said. “There’s her sister, for instance.”

“Well, it sure enough doesn’t take much skill to hit somebody with a shotgun,” Dwight agreed.

“Chauvinist. A lot of women shoot as good as a man. You taking the slicker now?”

He nodded. I found a hanger for the red velvet cloak and he put it back on the top rack. Then we turned out the lights, he locked up, and we walked down the slope to my car. As he carefully laid the raincoat on the backseat, Dwight said, “I know you’re tired and it’s out of the way, but you reckon we could run by the Pot Shot a few minutes? I’d like to see where this was hanging and maybe get that dowel before it goes missing.”

“You sure it can’t wait till morning?” I grumbled. “I’m really not up to another session with Denn.”

Dwight undipped his walkie-talkie from his belt. “Well, I suppose I could call Jack to come back.”

“Oh, get in,” I said crossly. “You know good and well you’re not going to haul any baby birds out of bed when I’m here to cart you around.”

At that hour, most of Cotton Grove was sleeping and Front Street was deserted. We headed south on Forty-Eight, and in less than ten minutes, I was turning in at the Pot Shot sign, then through the narrow lane, past the shrubbery, and into the farmyard. Lily met us at the gate, barking loud enough to wake the dead.

Well, no, actually, it wasn’t quite that loud.

“Stop!” Dwight yelled, but I was already stomping on the brakes.

Denn lay right where he must have stepped out of the pickup. The door on the driver’s side was still open and the cab light was still on.

This time, the killer had aimed the shotgun at Denn’s chest.

Baby Bird got hauled out of bed after all.

So did Terry Wilson.

I didn’t get to go home till almost four.

Michael Vickery’s funeral was one of the largest ever held out at Sweetwater Missionary Baptist Church. They opened up the Sunday school classrooms on either side of the main auditorium and brought in extra chairs and still the church was too full to hold all who wanted to attend.

Those who couldn’t get in took up positions outside around the open grave, and Duck Aldcroft and his two sons had their hands full trying to keep reporters and television cameramen out of the way of the pallbearers. I later heard that he’d actually raised his voice at one point, but I put that down to sensationalism.

I didn’t go.

I didn’t go to Denn McCloy’s funeral either, mostly because it was a private ceremony held on Long Island. His next of kin was a brother up there, a claims investigator for a national insurance company, I believe; and as soon as Denn’s body was released by the medical examiner, it was shipped north.

After only an hour’s sleep, I got up again Wednesday morning, showered, and drove back to Cotton Grove. Jed had just put on a pot of coffee when I knocked on the kitchen door.

“Deborah?” Except for his jacket and tie, he was already dressed for work and he smelled of fresh aftershave. It was still Old Spice, after all these years. He looked rested and untroubled.

“Can I come in, Jed? I need to see you and Gayle.”

“Sure. What’s wrong?”

Gayle came down the hallway, sleepy eyed and still in her nightgown. “Hey, Deborah. What’s up?”

“I wanted to tell you about Denn McCloy before you read about it in the paper or see it on TV,” I said.

“What about him?” asked Jed as Gayle smothered a yawn with the back of her hand. Her brown hair was rumpled and her soft cheek still held the impression of her pillow.

“He was killed last night,” I said. “Shot. Just like Michael Vickery.”

Gayle’s brown eyes widened and she sat down on a stool at the breakfast counter. “Murdered?” Her small toes curled around the stool rungs.

“Who did it?” asked Jed.

“They don’t know yet. It only happened around midnight.” I glanced at the blue wall clock over the sink. “Six hours ago.”

“Sit down,” said Jed, pulling a chair out at the breakfast table. He poured me a cup of coffee and he remembered that I liked it black.

“You look like you had a rough night,” he said gently. “Were you there?”

“Not when it happened. A few minutes later.” The coffee was too hot to drink but I drank it anyhow. “There’s no easy way to say this, Jed.”

I turned to Gayle. “You wanted to know what happened to your mother, honey? Apparently Michael Vickery killed her. I don’t think he meant to or wanted to, but all the same, he did.”

“Michael?”

First they were incredulous and then they peppered me with questions. In the early morning hours while technicians measured and charted, photographed and videotaped, I’d thought about what I was going to say.

At one point, I’d asked Dwight, “Do you have to speculate about who those two Cotton Grove lesbians in Denn’s story were?”