The Essay A Novel (21 page)

Without looking at my mom, I asked, “Are you sure Edgel went out of town for the Farnsworths?”

“That's what he told me he was doing. He called me at the truck stop yesterday afternoon and said he had to make a run to West Virginia. That's all I know.”

That was Vinton County Deputy Dewey LaMarr. Again, four area fire departments are fighting an inferno at the Morgan Lumber Company, which you heard Deputy LaMarr say is fully engulfed and destined to be a total loss.

Tears were now rolling down my mother's cheeks. She was biting the first knuckle of an index finger. “They'll put him in prison forever, Jimmy Lee. They won't fool with him this time. He'll never get out.”

“Mom, you don't know that it was Edgel.”

She looked at me as though she had conceived, birthed, and raised the most ignorant human being on earth. “Oh God, Jimmy Lee, he'll never breathe free air again after this.” I hugged Mom and she sobbed a wet ring on my shoulder.

After a while, I released my grip and she dabbed at her eyes while the tears continued to flow. I went back inside, slipped on a pair of shoes and a jacket, and went back to the porch. “Where are the keys to the pickup?” I asked.

“Why do you want them?”

“I'm going to drive over to the Farnsworths' junkyard and see if Edgel's car is in the lot and the truck is gone.”

“I'm going with you.”

A few minutes later, Mom came out of the house wearing a nightgown extending below her beige raincoat, a pair of white, thick-soled shoes that she wore at the truck stop diner, and carrying her purse. “That's a good look, Mom.”

She hit me in the arm, glad for the moment of humor. We got into the pickup truck and headed down the drive. It was only a little more than four miles to the Farnsworths' junkyard, but it was a fifteen-minute drive over Township Road 3 as it snaked over Ingham Hill. “It could be a fluke, Mom. It might not have been Edgel.”

“That boy has a good heart, but a temper like a firecracker and the good sense that God gave a goose. I love him to death, but I swear he has never made a rational decision in his life.”

“I think you've been listening to Dad for too long. I've gotten to know Edgel since he came home. He's not as bad as Dad always made him out to be. Edgel's got a lot of common sense. And he told me he doesn't ever want to go back to prison. He wouldn't risk that by doing something like this.”

“They'll blame him, no matter what. I know they will.”

No amount of consoling was going to calm her down. We drove past the old entrance to the Gem of Egypt Mining Company's No.9 mine and down the grade to the Farnsworths' junkyard, which consumed a plateau of a strip-mined hilltop. I eased the pickup onto the rutted, gravel parking lot that surrounded a cinder block building with milkweed growing from the cracked foundation. A ten-foot chain link fence with concertina wire extended from both sides of the building. I swung the pickup around so the high beams could scan the yard beyond the gates. Edgel's Rocket 88 was nowhere to be found, but sitting just inside the gate and alongside the south side of the building was the flat-bed Ford. My heart and lungs felt as though they would explode and I was suddenly chilled.

“What?” my mom asked. I didn't answer. “Jimmy Lee, what?

Finally, I nodded toward the Ford. “That's the truck that Edgel drives when he makes pickups for the Farnsworths,” I said. “The Rocket 88 isn't here, either. He always parks it right there in that open spot inside the gate.”

“He lied to me?”

I shrugged. “I don't know, Mom, I don't know.”

Chapter Seventeen

M

y mom sobbed and struggled to catch her breath all the way home from the junkyard. I was silent in my disappointment. By the time we got back to the house, the orange glow had intensified in the distance. The newscaster on WCHI said that Elk Township Fire Chief Deek Daniels had decided to allow the fire to burn itself out. There were no fire hydrants that far out in the township and the pumper trucks were virtually useless in fighting a fire of that magnitude. It was, after all, a large, wood frame building that housed tons of lumber. There was nothing in the building that wasn't fuel.

Neither of us could go back to bed. We sat on the porch swing, hands shoved deep in our coat pockets, our breath turning to vapor, and watched the orange glow until it was drowned out by the sunrise, which in turn revealed a haze of white smoke that had rolled into the hillsides. At six-thirty, just as I was preparing to get ready for school, I spotted a cloud of dust rising from where Red Dog Road intersects with County Road 12. The dust billowed in brown clouds that moved up the road. I watched the rising dust until the sources revealed themselves in the clearing below our property— three Vinton County Sheriff's cruisers. Two of the cars came up our drive; the third parked across our drive on Red Dog Road, blocking any escape route.

“Oh God, oh God, oh God,” my mother cried.

“Mom, go on inside. I'll talk to them.”

The two cars that ascended the drive did so in a slow, deliberate manner. They were doubtlessly scanning the property for my brother. When the lead car stopped in front of the house, Sheriff McCol-lough stepped out, hitching up his belt and scanning the tree line, his trademark toothpick wedged in the corner of his mouth. Two frowning deputies exited from the second car. The sheriff hadn't changed much since the day I had been hitting stones in the yard when he came looking for Edgel the last time. I knew this was about to be a repeat of that meeting. “G' morning,” he said, touching the brim of his black, cowboy-style hat.

“Morning, Sheriff.”

“Your brother hereabouts?”

“Which one?”

“Edgel.”

I shook my head. “No, sir.”

The sheriff removed his hat and squinted into the morning sun as he looked around the property, craning his neck as he checked out the old shed in the back. He slowly removed a handkerchief from his hip pocket and wiped out the sweatband of his hat before using it on a wide forehead, though I didn't see any sign of perspiration. “Where is he?” He put his hat back on and adjusted it low on his brow. “I need to talk to him.”

“I don't know, Sheriff, and that's the God's truth. He said he had to work last night and I haven't seen him since.”

“Working, huh? Where's he working?”

“Farnsworth Salvage.”

“That's an odd time to be working for a junkyard, the middle of the night, wouldn't you say?”

I shrugged. “He delivers and picks up parts. He has lots of odd hours.”

“Uh-huh. He's not in that house, is he, son?”

“No, sir.”

“Mind if I come in and have a look around?”

“I don't think that would be such a good idea right now, Sheriff. My mom's in there and she's been pretty upset lately. She and my dad split up, and I think this would just upset her more.”

“Where's your dad?”

“Florida. He went down there to work with Virgil at the carnival.”

“I thought he was working at the sawmill.”

“He was, but he lost that job.” It was information I suspect he already knew.

He nodded. “You know, it would be pretty easy for me to get a search warrant for that house.”

“You could, but it would be a waste of your time. I told you, Sheriff, he's not here.”

The sheriff pulled a business card out of his wallet and walked it up the steps to me. “When you see Edgel, you tell him it's real important for him to get in touch with me immediately.”

“Yes, sir, I will.”

As he started back down the steps, he turned, the brim of his hat covering his face in shadow. “Aren't you a little curious about why we want to talk to him?”

“My dad got fired from Morgan's mill and it burned to the ground last night. Edgel did nine years for arson. It doesn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure out why you want to talk to him.”

He winked and said, “Be sure to tell him to call.”

“I will.”

“You've got a big game tonight, don't ya?” he asked as he reached for his cruiser door.

“The biggest I've ever played in.”

“Good luck with that.”

“Thank you. I appreciate it.”

I watched as the cruisers turned around in the dried foxtail, leaving treadmarks in the frost, and headed back down the drive. The three cruisers parked at the bottom of the hill as the sheriff and deputies talked, I assumed, about how to keep an eye on the place. As the officers conversed, the school bus rolled to a stop at the bottom of the drive. When the door opened, one of the deputies walked over and spoke to the bus driver for a full minute. When he stepped away, the bus continued down Red Dog Road to the turnaround. I planned to go to school late as I didn't want to run out on my mother and I was hoping for a chance to speak to Edgel.

According to our quarterback and offensive captain Roy Otto, Coach Battershell was apoplectic when the bus arrived at school without me. Word must have reached Miss Singletary about the same time and she went running to the gym. “Where is he?”

“I have no idea,” said Coach Battershell.

They both looked at Roy, who shrugged. “I haven't seen him since we left the spaghetti dinner last night.”

Coach Battershell sent Roy to the office to tell Principal Speer to get someone to cover his classes because he was driving out to our house. Roy said Miss Singletary ran out of the school behind the coach. They jumped into Coach's Pontiac and headed toward Red Dog Road.

I was able to pick up the story shortly after this point as a parade of cars climbed our rocky drive. It was eight thirty when Edgel's Rocket 88 turned off of Red Dog Road into our drive. Coach Battershell's Tempest was right behind him, followed by two Vinton County Sheriff's cars, which had been hidden in the brush near the entrance to the dump. The cruisers charged up the hill with red lights flashing and sirens echoing off the hills. Coach Battershell stopped his car when he saw the lights and the sheriff's cars bound hard over the rocky edge of the driveway—one to the left, the other to the right—bouncing through the rock and weeded hillside and navigating around the rusting remains of the two-hundred-dollar specials, finally catching up to the Rocket as it pulled up alongside the front porch. The sheriff's cars slid broadside in the dirt and gravel in front of the house, sending up plumes of dust as the deputies climbed out with pistols drawn, screaming at Edgel to get his hands where they could see them.

Edgel looked up at me. Though I couldn't hear him over the dying sirens and the screaming deputies, I read his lips. “What the fuck?”

“Shut up and keep those hands where I can see them,” yelled one deputy with a brush cut and moon-shaped scar around his right eye. The three deputies surrounded the car, holding their revolvers with both hands and pointing them at Edgel's head.

Not being a total stranger to this routine, Edgel kept both hands on top of his steering wheel and did not move. One deputy opened the door while the other two barked at Edgel to get out of the car and on the ground. Edgel turned in the seat and dropped out of the car to his knees, hands interlocked behind his head. One of the deputies gave him a push and he went down hard on the side of his face. The same deputy holstered his revolver and handcuffed Edgel behind his back.

“We got a lot of questions for you,” said the deputy with the moon scar.

“Am I under arrest?” Edgel asked.

“We'll be the ones asking the questions, Hickam.” He spat out the name Hickam as though he had a mouthful of dog piss.

“I've got the right to know if I'm under arrest.”

“Right now, you're being held on suspicion of arson.”

Edgel raised his head, one side was covered with dust and flecks of red dog, and said to me, “Tell Mom to call Mr. Crawford and have him meet me at the jail.”

Timothy Crawford had been Edgel's court-appointed attorney on the burglary charge years ago. Moon Scar leaned down close to Edgel's face and sneered, “Lawyering up already, Hickam? I'd say that's a sure sign of someone who knows his ass is in the soup.”

“I know my rights, deputy, and I'm not saying another word until I speak with my attorney.”

Moon Scar watched as the other two deputies each hooked him under an arm and lifted Edgel to his feet. He looked at me for a moment and his eyes held a desperation that I had never seen, even when he was in prison. As they lowered his head and shoved him into the back of one of the cruisers, Coach Battershell and Miss Singletary walked up to the porch. Inside, I could already hear Mom talking to the receptionist at the Athens law firm of Crawford and Oschendorf.

As the two cruisers headed back down the drive and toward the county jail in McArthur, Mom came running out of the house and down the steps. “Where are you going?” I asked.

“Down to the jail. My boy needs me. I'll call when I know something.” Coach and Miss Singletary stood on the porch with me while Mom gunned the pickup, throwing pebbles against the bare lattice at the bottom of the porch.

“What's going on?” Miss Singletary finally asked.

“They just took Edgel in for suspicion of arson,” I said.

“Oh no, for the fire at the sawmill?” she asked.

“I think that's a safe bet.”

“Where was he last night?”

I shook my head. “I don't know. Hopefully, working.” But in my mind I could visualize Edgel parked along a dirt road on the top of a hillside, sitting on the hood of the Rocket 88, his back resting against the windshield, sipping a bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon and laughing as he looked down on the carnage he had created. “What are you guys doing here?”

“Looking for you,” Coach Battershell said. “I know you probably have a lot on your mind right now besides football, but you can't play tonight if you're not in school today.”