Crossed Bones (16 page)

"Coleman's inside with Scott," Cece said. "I knew it was important to get here early for photos. I got one of Scott at the coffin. It's going to make the national wire. That Garvel was dragging his feet. I swear, he makes one want to do something drastic. One day when he's asleep with his feet propped up on his desk, I'm going to wax his hairy legs."

"Cece!" I wasn't shocked at the idea of waxing legs, but Garvel's legs were repulsive. He had pasty white skin and black curly hairs. It had been a subject of much disgusted commentary even in fifth grade.

"Don't act so prim and proper," Cece warned. "You'd like nothing better than to tear Garvel's leg hairs out by the roots and you know it."

I didn't answer. Several cars had pulled into the churchyard, and men and women were gathering on the church steps. Cece, Tinkie, Chablis, and I stepped to the side. We were not the primary participants in this ritual. A black limo pulled up to the church and a tall, slender man walked around and helped Ida Mae out.

"That's Emanuel," Tinkie whispered in my ear. He had the look of a zealot. He was not a man who found joy in many things. His angry gaze swept the churchyard, surveyed the clump of men, and landed on us. Abruptly he dropped his mother's arm and stormed toward us, the other men flanking him.

"Get out of here," he said, waving his left hand angrily in our faces. "This is no place for white people. You came here to gawk and make money on my father's death. You've harvested enough profit from the blood of the black man--"

"Yeah, go away," one man said, waving his hands like he was shooing chickens.

"Emanuel." Ida Mae cut him short as she walked up. She put a hand on his arm. "Go inside. These people are my friends, and they're welcome here."

"They didn't know my father."

Ida Mae withdrew her hand but held her gaze steady on his. "Neither did you, son. And you had many opportunities."

"You're just like my father. You always side with the enemy."

"Emanuel, this isn't the time or place--" Ida Mae started.

Emanuel turned abruptly and stomped up the steps, his cohorts right on his heels. The church door was flung back against the cement-block wall.

"Forgive my son," Ida Mae said, and I knew it was a phrase she'd had a lot of practice saying. "He's hurting and he's mad at himself because it hurts. He'd convinced himself he didn't love his father. I'm sure the river of feelings that washed over him has caught him up in a wild current. He's scared."

"Scott Hampton's inside," I said. Emanuel had been merely rude
to
us. What would he do to the man accused of killing his father?

"Thank you. I'll--"

The sound of a loud chopper cut the still August morning. It was abrupt and explosive, and I knew that the rider had been laying in wait somewhere nearby. A second engine fired and the two motorcycles came flying out of the cotton field not twenty-five yards to the south of the church.

"Yee-hah!" Spider cried as he pulled the bike onto its rear tire and walked it across the front of the church not ten yards from Ida Mae.

"The only good jigaboo is a dead jigaboo!" Ray-Ban yelled as he repeated Spider's performance.

I saw the deputies coming from all directions. They had not drawn their firearms, but their hands were ready, fingers splayed just above the gun butts.

The two bikers wheeled around, headed back our way. Spider punched something on his bike and the strains of "
Dixie
" began to play.

Beside me, Ida Mae drew herself up tall. Every person who'd come to the funeral stood rooted to the spot, eyes on Ida Mae, faces showing horror, embarrassment, and sorrow.

Ida Mae took a deep breath. "... land of cotton, old times there are not forgotten, look away, look away, look away, Dixieland."

Rich and filled with sorrow instead of the jaunty march of soldiers, Ida Mae's voice saturated the summer morning.

"I wish I was in Dixie, hooray, hooray, in Dixieland I'll take my stand, to live and die in
Dixie
. Away, away, away down South in
Dixie
."

The officers had caught up with Spider and Ray-Ban. In ten seconds the bikers were restrained, the motorcycles' engines turned off, and the music stopped. Cece started the applause, and it spread over the gathering.

Ida Mae ignored everyone. She walked up to Spider and stared him dead in the face. "I know what you're trying to do, and it won't work. That's not your song, son. It's a song that belongs to everyone who lived through hard times in a land they loved. You can play it and you can try to defile it, but it doesn't belong to you, and your stink won't rub off on it."

She turned away from him and walked into the church just as Coleman came walking out. They exchanged a few whispered words.

"What should we do with them?" a deputy asked Coleman.

His mouth a tight line, he stared at Spider as he spoke. "Take them in, charge them, have the bikes towed."

"We ain't done nothin'!" Spider said. "No law against riding our motorcycles and playin' songs. That old black bitch wasn't hurt." He tried unsuccessfully to shake free of the two deputies who held him. "I can ride around this church till hell freezes over if I want. You got an innocent man locked up for a crime he didn't commit. Until you let Scott go, we're gonna be a wart on your backside, Sheriff."

The right corner of Coleman's mouth took a downward slant, and I couldn't tell if he was going to laugh or was angry. "Take them on," he said to the deputies.

"You can't do that!" Spider put a hand on his handlebars, but it didn't stay even a split second when the deputy stepped closer.

"Watch me," Coleman said. "You boys can reclaim your bikes at the sheriff's office. Tomorrow or the next day."

I started up the steps to speak to Coleman, but he was already walking into the church.

"I've got to get this film back to the newspaper," Cece whispered in my ear. "I can make the afternoon paper if I hurry."

"What about the service?" Tinkie asked. She was clutching Chablis to her as if the bikers wanted to dognap the little fluffball, which wasn't as far-fetched as it might sound.

"Garvel can stay here. This is a national story and the competition is too keen." She nodded at a young redhead who was scribbling furiously in a notepad as television cameras panned the reporter and the church.
"Entertainment Today,"
Cece whispered.

I heard the strains of an organ, and I nodded at Tinkie that it was time to go inside. Together we walked into the church and took a seat in the back.

Throughout the service, my attention strayed from Scott to Coleman. One sat beside Ida Mae and the other stood against the wall, not twenty feet from where I sat. Emanuel was sitting all the way across the church from his mother and Scott. If looks could kill, Scott would be skewered and charbroiled.

The service went without incident. Glowing tributes to Ivory were paid by friends and relations. To my surprise, neither Ida Mae nor Emanuel spoke. The church was crowded to overflowing, and many of those attending were strangers. Judging from the expensive and unconventional attire, several were prominent in the music field. Their attention was on Scott. But his was on Ida Mae and on the plain pine coffin that dominated the front of the small church.

It was a brief service, and I was relieved to walk outside into the bright humidity. Tinkie and I stood out of the way as Coleman led Scott to a patrol car. He would not be allowed to go to the cemetery.

"Let's go home," Tinkie said.

"Sure." I was worn out.

"What's next?" Tinkie asked. She unpinned the hat from Chablis and the little Yorkie gave her chin a slurpy lick of appreciation.

"I don't know," I said, getting behind the wheel. "I honestly don't know."

14

I
dropped Tinkie and Chablis at Hilltop and I went
on to town. 1 stopped at the bakery and bought sandwiches, oatmeal-raisin cookies, and two large cups of fresh coffee. Doc Sawyer was my next target, and I wasn't going to risk the stuff in his coffeepot again. Perhaps he was conducting an experiment on bionic caffeine. The same brew had been in that pot for at least nine months.

Main Street
was bustling as I drove through town. Traditionally, Saturday was market day, and the fruit stand at the end of town was jammed. Hand-painted signs advertised boiled peanuts, satsumas, the last of the season's Vidalia onions, tomatoes from Joe Cramer's farm, early turnips, and a vibrant selection of the first fall mums. Pickup trucks were parked in a jumble as people wandered among the produce and plants.

I had my attention on a display of plump scuppernongs when out of the corner of my eye, I saw Connie Peters. And Coleman. He was holding two pots of yellow mums, walking about five paces behind his wife. I kept driving until I turned into the hospital parking lot.

Doc Sawyer was in his office, and he frowned as I walked in.

"You look like you need a good dose of castor oil," he said, eyes lighting up as he saw the bakery bags in my hands. "What'd you bring?"

"Nothing for you." I was fond of Doc, but I didn't like his diagnosis.

"You look peaked," he said, refining his earlier statement. "What's wrong? You got a stomachache?"

"No." I didn't want to pursue this line of questioning. It wasn't what I'd eaten but what I'd seen that had upset me. "
Turkey
or ham? Coffee or coffee?" I held out both bags.

Doc cast a glance at the coffeepot in the corner as if I might have hurt its feelings. That coffee had been around long enough that it might have developed feelings. "Ham," he said, taking the bag with the sandwiches.

I sat down in the chair in front of his desk, and he took a seat behind it. I was busy unwrapping my sandwich when he spoke again.

"How are you, Sarah Booth? Really?"

I pushed the tomato back inside the bread and licked my finger before I answered. "There are days when I feel like I'm about thirteen. Emotionally." Doc had tended my broken collarbone and removed my tonsils. He knew a lot of my foibles.

"Arrested adolescence," he said with a nod of his head. "A man must be involved."

I didn't deny it. Instead I took a big bite of the sandwich.

"Your appetite's still good, so I guess it isn't fatal." He chuckled as I threw him a black look. "I can't imagine a man who wouldn't throw himself down at your feet, Sarah Booth. What's this fool's name?"

I shook my head. While Doc knew many of my secrets, he wasn't the repository for Coleman's. "You're right, it isn't fatal, so let's forget about it."

Doc sipped his coffee, nodding. "This is good."

"Yeah, it's fresh," I hinted.

"I heard Tinkie had fixed you up with a blind date."

Drat Tinkie's hide! I didn't like everyone in town looking at me like some kind of social charity case. While I enjoyed blind dates, most folks looked on them as a last-ditch effort to have a social life.

"Don't look like a thundercloud. Cece told me about it in the strictest confidence. She hinted that blood tests might be in order. Is that why you're here?"

"Hold on a minute," I said, almost spilling my coffee as I leaned forward. "No one's said a thing about a wedding."

Doc grinned, pleased at his ability to get a reaction out of me. "So why are you here?"

"Ivory Keys."

The smile slipped from Doc's face. "That was a terrible thing. I meant to get out to the funeral this morning but I got tied up with Kelly Webster. Her son broke his leg. Fell out of a pear tree in Mrs. Hedgepeth's yard. I thought I would have to treat her for apoplexy. She was mad as a hornet."

If Doc was trying to divert me, it wasn't going to work. "Coleman told me Ivory died between two and four in the morning. Can you tell me anything else?"

"Stabbed three times, one piercing the heart."

"Was he beaten before he was stabbed?"

He gave me a long look. "He was."

"What else can you tell me?" Doc was being unusually reticent. Normally I didn't have to pry information out of him.

"What did Coleman tell you?"

I knew then that there was something significant I hadn't been told. Coleman was doing his job, but I still felt the white-hot tingle of fresh anger. We'd always been square with each other. Or at least he'd always been square with me. Until now. "Coleman didn't tell me anything. That's why I'm here, Doc. Ida Mae Keys has paid me to find out the truth. I owe it to her to do that, and I can't when everyone is keeping secrets from me."

Doc chewed the last bite of his sandwich and reached for a cookie. "Coleman has his reasons, Sarah Booth."

"No doubt. But if Scott Hampton is guilty, that's what I'll find out."

"I never realized private investigators were bound by the truth," Doc said, not bothering to hide his skepticism.

"Ida Mae believes Scott is innocent. If I can't prove that, I'll tell her so."

Doc wadded up his sandwich wrapper and tossed it in the trash. When he leaned forward at his desk, light from the window caught the fine white hair that fluffed out around his head. "There was a symbol cut into Ivory's back." He turned slightly away, tossing the lid to his coffee in the trash.