The Daisy Ducks (27 page)

"Dr. Gayle, would it be possible to go back
upstairs for a minute or so? With the officer, of course?"

He said he didn't see why not. The officer followed,
completing his spiel from the Miranda decision. Back in the dead
pilot's room, I explained my earlier curiosity to Dr. Gayle, who
confirmed that no painkillers whatsoever had been administered.

"Before you shut the door on the patient and the
priest," I said, "he was regaining consciousness. I saw him
move his head. Shortly afterward he was in a deep sleep and obviously
in no discomfort. Considering the extent of his injuries, I suspected
a strong analgesic. Since you did not give any, I now suspect
something else."

"Such as?"

"Such as heroin. A massive dose. And we both
know how it could have easily been given."

Dr. Gayle examined the top of the latex I.V. tube
just beneath the bottle. Squeezing the rubber between his fingertips,
he found the tiny hole where the syringe had been inserted. This is
standard procedure for additional medication, as it does away with
the need for additional injections in the patient's arm.

"The priest?"

"Yep. Only he wasn't, of course. Have you ever
seen that priest before?"

"No. I assumed he came from out of town because
he spoke Spanish."

"Wel1, he came here to kill the pilot, and he
succeeded. He injected the tube with a lethal dose, knowing it would
take a minute or two to reach the pilot's vein. The killer knew he
had enough time to disappear."

"Let me ask you a question," said the
officer. "How do we know you didn't kill him?"

"What reason would I have to kill him? The man
who did killed him because the pilot would eventually talk, revealing
him and his partners."

"Uh-huh. And how do we know you 're not one of
the partners?"

Good question. I thought
for maybe twenty seconds, then decided to go out on a limb. After
all, it appeared that I was going "downtown" whether I
liked it or not. Undoubtedly the state trooper with the notebook
would appear on the scene sooner or later. I had to cooperate now,
and spill the beans totally.

* * *

I sat at the table in the Robbinsville police
station. It was only a few minutes before the sheriff, Roger Penland,
came over from his office behind the courthouse down the street to
look in on me. Right neighborly of him. Then, after we'd been there
forty minutes, my old friend came sashaying in: the state trooper
with the R. J. Gold chaw in his cheek. Gee, the place was friendly.
Southern hospitality is real.

"Well, lookey here," he said. "If it
idn't the doctor who's always trying to git over to Gatlinburg. Well,
they told me on the radio you wanted to see me."

He introduced himself as James Hunnicutt, and I shook
his hand.

He sat down at the table with the local police. All
of them stared at me.

"I'd rather you not tape this conversation,"
I said, "but I suppose I don't have the final say on that. But I
am waiving the right to a lawyer. I am trusting you, and I hope you
trust me likewise. Mr. Hunnicutt, I'll tell you straight off I was
not trying to get to Gatlinburg last night —"

"Early this morning," he corrected me,
looking at the notebook. "Three forty-seven A.M. And I didn't
think you's a-goin' to Gatlinburg . . . or Knoxville neither."

"No. I was going to visit the Royce farm
property to retrieve some personal items I had left there the
previous night."

The men around the table looked at each other. Two of
them took out notebooks.

"You're admitting to trespassing?" asked
Hunnicutt.

"Yes. Trespassing only, not breaking and
entering. I stole nothing. But I did come across some interesting
equipment there which you ought to take a look at. That plane was not
there by coincidence."

Then I proceeded to tell Sheriff Penland, Sergeant
Hunnicutt, and the local oflicer what I had found while another
patrolman placed two phone calls, one to Brian Hannon and another to
Joe's office. By the time he returned, the station had received a
preliminary report from the county morgue that the bloodstream of the
dead pilot had contained enough heroin "to fell a timber-haulin'
mule."

The men then turned to the junior officer, who had
just returned to the table.

"You git through?" asked Hunnicutt.

"Yes sir. I caught 'em both in, too. The police
chief, Hannon, told me he could vouch for his character, but not for
his intelligence or common sense."

The men around the table stared at me.

"Umm. And what did the other man say? The state
trooper?"

"Same thing, sir. Said that Dr. Adams was not a
killer. But he said that any other damn fool thing he might have
done, well, he could believe it."

They stared at me again. I shrugged and swiveled in
the chair. When I got back to Concord, I would get them. If I got
back. Who could tell? Maybe I'd be doing two-to-five on a chain gang.
Oh well, at least I'd stay in shape and learn some good songs . . .

"All right, doctor. Let's go over to the Royce
place. I can have a warrant real fast. But there better be something
there, hear? Bill Royce and his family are friends of ours. And he's
a veteran of Vietnam. I mean, I like to tell you, there better be a
reason."

I assured them there would be, but I was careful to
mention Royce's positive qualities as we got into the patrol cruiser
and headed for the farm. On the way, I filled them in on the exploits
of the Daisy Ducks, the shooting of Roantis, and my involvement in
the affair, which had taken me to Texas and Carolina. We went to the
farm first. I led them over to the farm road and began pacing the
edge of it. Any second now I would see one of those glass eyes of the
runway lights . . . any second . . .

But after ten minutes it was clear they weren't
there. I remembered that they had been stuck into the ground on metal
spikes. All Royce and his men had to do was yank them out. And the
cable connecting them to the power source? Yanked out too. I pointed
out the shallow furrows in the soil that marked the cable's eruption
and disappearance. The officers were curiously unimpressed. Strange,
I thought, for men who were supposedly well trained.

Next, I led them over to the old pump house. Empty.
Finally, the tree with the antenna and the control box. Gone. I
searched the pine tree carefully and found the faint marks in the
rough, resinous bark where nails and staples had been driven into it.
But they cared not a fig. I ask you, is this law enforcement?

"I know this doesn't look good," I said to
the four stone faces giving me the once-over, "but believe me —"

"We don't, " growled Hunnicutt.

And it didn't get any better when we went into the
old tobacco barn, either. Fastened to the tractor was an
honest-to-God drill planter, complete with seed cans. And there were
sacks of seed around the walls, too. Damn!

"Well, let's go back to the cruiser, boys,"
said Hunnicutt. "Hell, at least Bill didn't know we was here.
It'd be right embarrassin' if he'da known."

"Can you wait a second? There's one more thing
I'd like to check," I said, heading over to the brush-covered
knoll at a fast walk. But I knew the answer before I even got there.
The binoculars and thermos bottle were gone. I wasn't surprised.

Back at the station, they had me wait in a cell while
they all sat around the front table and had a powwow. The cell was
unlocked and the door slid open. I'll give them credit for that. But
it wasn't a nice place.

I had myself a little think while I sat on the
prisoner's cot. Life is funny. You never know what curves it's going
to throw you. I mean, take my situation: three months ago I was
getting fresh with lovely Janice DeGroot in the phone closet of my
elegant house in New England. I was a hot shot. Now I'm sitting in a
jail cell in North Carolina while my wife is going out with her high
school sweetheart. Yep, life is really funny. Life is a regular riot,
is what it is.

I had stamped three cockroaches to death before the
door opened and Sheriff Penland walked in. He returned with the
announcement that while they weren't going to detain me, I had
certainly better stay put in North Carolina—in either Asheville or
Graham County. And I had better let the authorities know where I
could be reached at all times.

"We'll be a-watchin' you, Doc," said
Sheriff Penland. "Don't do nthin' silIy."

I answered indignantly, saying I was not in the habit
of doing silly things.

So I went back to the campground and told the
perplexed Mr. Hardesty that I'd be staying another night. I hooked
the rig up again and sat and thought, then called Mary. She was home
by now. Or supposed to be. Who knew? Maybe she and Leon Kondracki
were on the interstate this very minute, heading for Niagara Falls
....

"Hello?"

"Mary! Thank God, you're home!"

"Hi honey. Of course I'm home. Where else would
I be?"

"Oh, anywhere. Niagara Falls maybe . . ."

"Charlie, are you okay?"

"No, and I'll tell you why."

I told her exactly what had happened.

"Charlie, I warned you not to use your best
judgment. But you went and did it anyway. Now let me ask you this:
what's going to happen when Bill Royce comes looking for you?"

"He wouldn't dare. He's in too much trouble
already. And he knows that the law is watching me too. I'll just sit
tight until Roantis and Summers show up, then let them take over.”

"What makes you so sure Royce was involved with
shooting Roantis?"

"One: he was in the outfit. Two: he appeared
stateside at the right time. Three: he's a crook and a drugrunner.
Four: he's an addict now and desperate. Desperate for drugs and money
to get them, both for himself and his pipeline. Five: hell, I don't
need five. Four's good enough."

"Charlie? Promise you won't do anything until
they show up?"

"Yes."

"Good. And when they show, you head for New
England."

Then I had to give her the bad news about my having
to stay in North Carolina until various matters, like murder, were
resolved. Needless to say, she wasn't pleased. She said she was going
to have a talk with her brother Joe, then she was going to call me
back.

"Mary, do you love me?"

"I guess." She sighed. "But it's
getting hard, pal. Real hard."

Back in my RV, I realized how hungry I was; it was
almost six, and I hadn't eaten all day. I set the fire going again
under the big pot that held my half-completed New England dinner.
When it was boiling, I added the vegetables to the meat and let it
cook. I lighted a pipe and put coffee on. Things weren't so bad after
all. While my dinner finished cooking, I read the new
Sports
Afield
and looked outside in the dying light
to watch the snow melt. More and more patches of ground were visible,
and the trickle and wash of runoff grew louder and louder. It was
what was going to happen back home in six or seven weeks. I wished I
had some company. I missed Mary. And her absence was more painful not
only because of recent events but because of the great distance.
Being thirty miles away from a loved one is much easier than nine
hundred. I missed Jack and Tony. I missed my dogs too. I would have
felt a lot better with a couple of them lounging around the campsite.
I took the coffee mug and my pipe outside and sat on a picnic bench.
The earth was soft and aromatic. But I still had the feeling that
somebody had painted a set of giant concentric rings on the earth
around my camper: it was a huge target, and I was sitting right in
the center of it.

I sat outside and ate two big bowls of the New
England boiled dinner, spreading fresh horseradish all over the
chunks of corned beef. By then it was dark and getting colder by the
second. I quickly built a small campfire, then walked down to the
office and asked Mr. Hardesty if anyone had called. He said no, which
seemed a little strange. Where was Roantis?

"Mr. Hardesty, has anyone called making a
reservation for a hook-up site?"

"Nope. Not a one. I guess if you hadn't come
back, I'd of closed up."

"Would you mind if I closed your gate and locked
it until tomorrow morning? I got hassled by a biker gang on the road
earlier today, and I think they might come here looking for me."

He went outside, shut and locked the gate, and
returned without uttering a word. I returned to the rig feeling a
little relieved. Only a little because I knew in my heart of hearts
that if Bill Royce and Company wanted to pay me a visit, they
probably wouldn't come stomping in through the gate. Oh no. They
would drop out of the sky, or come shooting down long ropes from the
mountain peaks, or sneak in, snake-crawling on their bellies through
the undergrowth, K-bar knives in teeth.

Aw c'mon Adams . . . That
stuff only happens in movies. I sat outside by the campfire and
listened to the silence. The snow was mostly melted, but now the
splash and tinkle of snow-melt had stopped too, and what snow there
was left would remain through the night. The temperature dropped
still more, and I went inside. It would have been enjoyable if Mary
or the boys were with me. Or even Moe, and we could play chess and
talk. I drew the curtains all around and read
Scientific
American
for two hours. I drank a mug of hot
water and bourbon to which I'd added lemon and honey. The hot toddy
made me warm all over, and sleepy too. I realized as I crawled into
the bunk that I'd had a rough day and it had left me exhausted.