Markers (Joshua Stokes Mysteries Book 3) (14 page)

Twenty-Two

Complications

Complications ought to be something Joshua Stokes was use to; his life had always been complicated. However, the complexities of life were not something one got
use
to easily. The intricacies of
his
life were interwoven and twisted into one gigantic knot that was wound so tightly he would never be able to untangle it.

When he got home the day before, Emma was still there. She had taken it upon herself to resume the weekly cleaning arrangement they had made before she was nearly decapitated by the Mexican. He did not talk to her; she was busy cleaning, changing the sheets on the bed and other mundane tasks. He was not mad at her for being there; he just was not in the mood to socialize. He took his usual position on the back porch in his rocker, propped his feet on the railing and sat a bottle of whiskey and a glass on the table beside him. Because he had just ran into her, he was thinking of Cricket and although he knew better than to do it, he was thinking of the ‘what ifs’ of his life. He was tired of living in the past, but damn sure did not like the way the future was panning out either. He wanted to have a relationship, but he was not ready for anything permanent. He liked Emma a lot, but felt she was too young. She must have sensed that he did not want to talk. He had sat there for nearly an hour before Emma came out to sit on the porch. She sat in the swing and touched up her nails as she sipped on co-cola and listened to music. Except for the music playing low from the kitchen, it was quiet; it was peaceful. He could handle days like that.

Emma asked if he wanted her to cook supper. He told her he had stopped at the diner and bought a plate lunch and brought it home, but was not hungry. He told her that it was in the icebox, she could eat it if she wanted. Emma remembered the layer of grease on the ‘diner special’, he had in his refrigerator when she was running from the Dixon brothers, and declined. It made no difference to Joshua whether she ate it or not; if he had a dog, he would feed it to them.

Just before dark, Emma said that she was going to Wilmer to get a hamburger and fries; she asked if he wanted her to bring him anything; he declined. Just after dark, the mosquitoes drove him inside. The mosquitoes had been bad before, but seemed worse this year. He stripped off his sweaty clothes and took a shower to cool off, then decided to lie down for a little while. That was the last he remembered until the dream woke him during the night. He did not remember Emma coming back, or getting into bed with him. He knew they had not had sex - he was certain he would remember that. He was not drunk when he lay down, just tired, depressed.

Depression was not something Joshua dealt with very often. The last time he got
that
depressed was after the ‘suicide’ he arranged for the child molester back in the early sixties… dark days, days he tried to forget, but couldn’t… Joshua knew that everyone has a dark side. He knew his, and for the most part, accepted it. He decided he was not going to let his killing ‘Chester the Molester’ bother him anymore; life was too short. Why worry about the complications of it. The complications of life were not going anywhere; they would still be there, but he could ignore them if he tried hard enough. However, he could not ignore the dream from the night before; Margie’s words were fresh in his mind. Joshua wondered if there was a reason Margie had entered his dream. He cranked up and drove to the Hickory Pit Café in Semmes-he needed a cup of coffee. He was not at all surprised to see Hook’s pickup sitting in the parking lot.

When he walked in, Hook was bowed up on a barstool at the front counter; he was deep in conversation with Sim Maples. His back was to the door so Sim saw Joshua first.

“Mornin’ Sheriff,” he said cheerfully.

“Mornin’ Sim, Hook,” Joshua replied, taking a stool beside Hook. Hook whipped around on the stool; his expression showing that he was surprised to see Joshua there and questioning if something was wrong all at the same time.

“Morning, Sheriff, what can I get for you?” Jeanne asked, placing a cup and saucer in front of him and pouring the cup full of coffee.

“This is all I need, Hun” Joshua replied.

“Are you sure? Mama Jen just took a fresh pan of biscuits out of the oven and fried up a few pounds of bacon.”

“Hmm, go ahead and bring me one then and a couple of slices of bacon,” he said, realizing that he was hungry when his stomach begin to growl from the aroma of fresh baked biscuits and fried bacon.

As he and Jeanne had been discussing breakfast, he could hear Sim and Hook talking. The tone of Sim’s voice, and the manner of his speech reminded him of Joe Stringer. He wished he could have stopped at Joe’s Café. Joe definitely needed the business more, but when he saw Gypsy Jones’s car parked by the front door, he kept going. He was not in the mood to deal with dodging her advances so early in the day.

“Mornin’ Hoss, I didn’t expect to see you here. You’re lookin’ a little hollow-eyed this mornin’,” James said, turning his attention to Joshua when Jeanne finished taking his order. “Are you all right, Josh? You look a bit confused…”

“I just got stuff on my mind, James. Everything is fine.”

Sim finished his last sip of coffee, stood, and bid them farewell as he headed toward the door. Both responded with goodbyes and Jeanne wished him a good day.

“Where are you heading?” James asked.

“I’m not really headed anywhere,” Joshua said, responding to Hook’s question. “I need to go to my office and close out this McIllwain case but dread going. I want to ride up to the reservation and talk to Margie Redfeather.” He thought Margie might be able to shed some light on his recent dream. Her coming into it and calling him ‘Watauga’ had to have some sort of meaning to it. Jeanne brought his biscuit and bacon and set it in front of him; he immediately took a bite.

“Carlos’ mother? Hmm, whenever you get ready, I’ll ride with you.”

“Would you?” Joshua asked between bites.

“Of course I will. It’s always good for me to get away from the house for a spell; gives Ilene time to herself, and from how grouchy she was this morning, she’s overdue.”

“You reckon she’ll let you go?”

“She says I drive her crazy, Hoss. She’ll be glad to get rid of me for a few hours.”

Joshua chuckled - he knew how Ilene was when spending everyday with James was getting under her skin. She had run him away from the house plenty of times over the years. He finished his breakfast and swallowed his coffee.

“I’m going into town and take care of this business,” he said, “then tomorrow we’ll leave bright and early and ride up there.”

“Just let me know what time and I’ll be ready,” James replied.

Joshua could tell by his eyes that he was anxious to go with him. James’ excitement caused him to be a little excited too.

“I’ll pick you up at your house about this time in the morning. Be prepared for an ‘all-day-er’ I don’t want to have to rush.”

“Sounds good to me, Hoss, I’ll see you then” he said to Joshua’s back as Joshua walked out the door and headed to his patrol car.

Twenty-Three

Breaths

The air, like a hot, humid breath, blew into Joshua’s face as he stepped out of his pickup truck in front of Margie Redfeather’s dilapidated little shack on the Poarch Creek Indian Reservation in Escambia County. It almost took his breath with it as it wrapped around his body and encased him in a thin layer of dust that followed his truck when he come to a stop in front of her house. There was no sign of Carlos’s 1962 Lincoln Continental, a monstrosity of an automobile that was as wide as a dump truck. Joshua thought to himself that he never even thought to ride by Carlos’ house before making the trip; for all he knew, Margie Redfeather could be dead and Carlos could be in Mobile.

James got out of the passenger side and propped his foot on the running board as he looked around. Joshua was also looking. He looked toward Margie’s and he looked both ways up and down the road. He half-expected the cocky little reservation deputy, ‘Tom-Tom’, was what Carlos called him, to follow them in and threaten them the way he did the first time they came to talk to Margie. The squirrelly little Native American deputy had strutted like a peacock around them the last time they had come. That was one reason Joshua decided to drive his personal vehicle. He thought the reason the deputy had harassed him was because he was in his patrol car when he came the first time.

As if reading his thoughts, James said, “Maybe your pickup didn’t set off alarms with the natives like your patrol car did.”

“My thoughts exactly,” Joshua replied while lighting a cigarette. He blew out a thin plume of smoke and said, “I didn’t even think to go by Carlos’ house before making the trip up here; he might’ve already returned home.”

“Somebody’s here,” said Hook, speaking around the butt of the cigarette he was lighting. “I see a window cracked open on this side of the house and there’s a fan on in the window on the south side of the house to pull the heat out.”

“It’s his mama I want to talk to, so I reckon it don’t matter whether Carlos is here or not. You coming in with me or waiting out here.”

“If you don’t mind, Hoss, I’ll wait out here,” replied Hook, taking a long pull on his cigarette. “Besides that damned ghost in there, Miss Margie gets a little
too
personal for my liking… makes me get a little willy-nilly.”

“Suit yourself,” Joshua responded, dropping his cigarette to the ground and stepping on it. “Be back in a bit.”

Joshua walked up onto the little stoop that sufficed as a front porch and knocked on the door. He heard a woman’s voice call out “who is it?”

“It’s Joshua Stokes, ma’am,” he replied.

After a moment, the door swung open and a young woman stood in the entry. Joshua was not sure who she was, but thought she could have been one of Carlos’ children. She favored his daughter Faye a good bit, but was younger. He could not see into the room that well, it was too dark, the same as the first time he came.

“Morning, Sheriff. My name is Betty Sue; I’m Carlos’ next to youngest daughter. You probably don’t remember me though.”

“I apologize, Hun, but no, I don’t remember you.”

“Don’t make that young man stand out there in the heat, invite him in!” Margie Redfeather exclaimed from somewhere behind the girl.

The girl stepped aside and allowed him to enter. He saw that she paused a moment before closing the door while she gazed at Hook who had walked over to sit beneath the shade of a sycamore tree.

“What brings you all the way up here, nephew?” Margie asked. Joshua turned toward the sound of her voice and saw that Margie Redfeather was lying in bed, but had risen up onto one elbow to question him.

“How are you, Miss Margie-”

“Call me Aunt Margie,” she said grumpily. Joshua did not feel right doing it, but figured if that was what she wanted then that was exactly what she would get.

“Yes, Ma’am, I needed to talk to you about something.”

When trying to respond, Margie began to cough heavily. Chest wracking coughs that left her without the ability to catch her breath. It took her a minute or two to do so; Joshua felt helpless as he stood there waiting.

“Are you not doing well? Is there anything I can get for you?” he asked, once she had caught her breath.

“Go ahead; pull that little stool over here and sit beside my bed.” Joshua did as told. “Now - ask what is on your mind, Nephew.” Margie’s lips parted in a toothless grin that made him want to smile back, but at the same time made him feel that she already knew what he wanted to ask.

“Sheriff?” Betty Sue interrupted before he could speak. He turned to look at her, wondering why she had interrupted before he even got started.

“Sheriff, do you think your friend might run me to the store while you and Gamma talk. Papa was supposed to be back yesterday, but he never came. We need a couple of things from the store and I need to use their phone to call him and see if everything is all right. If it wasn’t important, I wouldn’t have asked,” she said earnestly.

Joshua told her that of course he could and then walked out onto the porch and called to James who was now lying under the shade tree chewing on a blade of grass. James agreed to run Betty Sue to the general store, he asked Joshua if he needed anything while he was there; Joshua declined; he was more anxious to talk with Margie than to worry about co-cola’s and candy bars. Once James and the girl had gone, Joshua sat on the small stool and turned to face Margie. She reached out a frail age-spotted hand toward him. He took her small hand in his larger one and rested both on his knee.

“Now, speak your mind, Nephew. If you don’t ask now, you might not ever get another chance,” she said matter-of-factly. “I may not be for this world much longer.”

“I had a dream the other night… You and Carlos were in it. We were on the riverbank by my house - except I was a child… Nearly everyone I know or have known - especially those I loved, was there. A preacher man stood waist deep in the water, he was across the river from us. They walked into the water, disappeared, and then emerged on the other side where the preacher was. He baptized them and then shoved them away. They disappeared beneath the water as they floated away. In the dream you told me I could not go with them; you called me, “Watauga,” and said something about the water and how it flowed around things…”

“You must study the earth, Watauga; it teaches you that you must be like the water… Be gentle as you make your way around things; seep slowly through the cracks and crevices. Do not be forceful, but adjust to the object and you shall find a way around or through it.” Margie’s tone was thoughtful. “Watauga is the name your grandfather would have called you - it means to be watchful and learn-he would have explained to you that you should be like the water. Even if boulders jutting up from the riverbed break the water, the water rejoins and heals itself once it has passed the obstacle in its path - you should do the same. You have done this many times, Watauga.” Joshua stared deep into Margie’s eyes - eyes that seemed familiar… they were his mother’s eyes. “Your grandfather, my brother, could not adjust to the objects that lay in his path. He turned his turmoil inside and it smoldered until it drove him insane. Do not do this Nephew. Let go your sorrows; let them flow away from you so they cannot destroy you. Be like the water Watauga, and mend as each passes through, around, and away. Don’t follow them and try to hang on; they will take you into the depths of hell.”

“Is that what happened to my mother? Did she hang onto something she shouldn’t have or did she push me away to save herself,” Joshua asked, remembering the dream-memory of his mother standing in the glow of headlights telling him to run. He had had another vision or memory of that night. He remembered someone walking up behind his mother as she stood in the lights. They wrapped a white colored blanket or jacket of some sort around her. He saw her struggle with them before she yelled for him to run. Margie stared into Joshua’s eyes for a long time, seeming to gather her thoughts to her before she spoke again. She let go his hand and asked him to help her sit up on the side of the bed.

“I will answer your questions, Nephew, but I need you to help me onto the pot first,” she pointed to the potty chair sitting in the corner of the room. Joshua helped her to stand and then gathered her walker to her when she indicated she wanted it. He waited until she was to the potty chair and then excused himself and walked outside and lit a smoke. He stared toward the way they had come and saw the wavering of heat devils rising off the blacktop road a quarter mile away. The temperature had to be hovering somewhere near ninety degrees and it was not even noon yet - it was barely ten o’clock. He could imagine what the afternoon would bring.

Joshua thought he heard the rumble of distant thunder and turned to look to the west. Far on the western horizon, he saw dark clouds building over Mississippi. Rain would cool it down temporarily, but then it would turn into a steam bath. He wondered if he would have time to finish his talk with Margie before the storm reached them. He had heard that if you counted from the time you saw the flash of lightning until you heard the thunder, ever how many you counted, that was how many miles away it was. He saw a flash of lightning and began to count. He counted to eighteen before he heard the low rumble of thunder begin. Eighteen miles… closer than what he had thought.

A dark shadow suddenly loomed overhead, spread out, and then passed swiftly across the yard. Joshua glanced upward. He saw a hawk gliding across the sky toward a grove of pine trees that lay to the west of Margie’s house. It disappeared from view and then reemerged high over the pines.

He expected it to alight, but it kept going, flying west toward the storm. Maybe it wants to cool off by flying though the rain, thought Joshua as he inhaled a toke of his cigarette. Figuring he may have time to finish his smoke, he leaned against a rickety post that held up the roof of the stoop. He would not mind playing in the rain too, he thought to himself as he felt sweat rising on the back of his neck and trickling down his spine.

“You can come back in,” Margie called from inside. Joshua took one last pull on his smoke before tossing it out into the yard. He heard another rumble of thunder and glanced longingly at the dark clouds. Joshua loved the rain. He loved the darkness of it and the coolness of it; and, even though he had been struck by lightning before, and almost died from it, he liked it too… Margie had made it back to the bed and was sitting on the side of it with her walker in front of her. She was leaned forward with her arms propped on it for support. She took a deep ragged breath. “The storm will be here soon,” she said. “It will cool things down and settle the dust too. You should be on your way before it gets here. It is not a good storm,” her voice was almost sad in its tone. “Ask your questions, Watauga, and I will try to answer them; we don’t have much time.”

Joshua could see that Margie was having difficulty breathing, but did not seem to be so bad off that she could not tell him what he needed to know.

“I came to ask you about the dream… it didn’t make a lot of sense-”

“That is not all you seek answers to… I see your questions in your eyes.”

“What happened to my mother? I feel something else happened before she disappeared. I dreamt I was a child - we were on the dam at Big Creek… I saw a car sliding into the water.” Margie’s eyes met his full on.

“You were a small child when that happened. You have a powerful memory.”

“No, I don’t. I don’t know
how
I remember that or if it even is a memory.”

“Your father was not a bad man, Watauga, but even good men have faults. His weakness was a tender heart - it killed him. Your mother’s weakness was her father’s blood… for one that had been strong as a child - she grew weak as an adult.

When the people from the orphanage came hunting her family - I went down to Mobile and met with her-that was how I knew my brother had tried to kill the whole family. Anna said that she knew he was going to kill them, the same as he killed their mother. She hid her brother and sister from him… That she kept the visions in is my fault. I told her that if she chose to stay with the white people at the orphanage, that she must not tell them of the visions. They would not understand the way of the Indian… but I did not bring the voices to her, that was her father… the voices told him to kill them… to kill his wife and children. Those are the demon voices-not spirit guides. After he killed her mother, Anna waited for him to fall asleep. She took his gun and killed him with it. She told the authorities that he killed himself… but they knew the truth. She was just a child, trying to protect her family… the vision you have as a child is of your mother running away-she was running from your father, from you… from the demon voices…

When Anna was older and came searching for her brother and sister, she told me the visions were getting worse; she could not tell what was real and what was not. The same demons that plagued her father began to plague her too. When the demons took control of her mind, your father had her committed. They sent her to a hospital in Tuscaloosa to recover… She never wanted you to inherit the family curse, Watauga, but you have the gift too-you can see what others cannot. You have dealt well with prophecy; some seers are not as lucky. They prophesy to the world and warn of impending disasters, yet cannot see what is right before them.”

It did not bother Joshua in the least that his mother had killed her father - it sounded like he was a fucking lunatic and needed killing; what bothered him was that she let it drive her insane and most likely was the cause of him growing up without her.