Morning light is reflecting off the well-deserved gold stars on Billy’s shirt pocket. (His hair smells of wild lavender, by the way.) “Gonna go look around some,” he tells me, slinking off with a bashful smile. Thanks to that idiot Holloway, Keeper’s nursin’ a horrible hangover. Wouldn’t even suck a raw egg, and he’s listing to port. Clever teases him, saying, “Ya know what ya need? What ya need is the hair of the dog, son.” (Since her mother is the town drunk, she is quite knowledgeable in these day-after-a-hoedown remedies.)
When he gets done doing his Reconnaissance: The act of reconnoitering, especially to gain information about an enemy or a potential enemy, Billy comes back into the cave and tells Clever and me, “It looks bad down in Browntown. A couple of the shacks burned to the ground and the dump is rubble. But there’s no sign of Willard or the sheriff. Now’d be a good time to hightail it back to the cottage.”
I would have to agree with him, as would Mr. Howard Redmond, who writes in The Importance of Perception in Meticulous Investigation:Time is of the essence.
So’s my loved ones.
After I make sure all’s well in the cottage, after I breathe in Grampa’s smoky smell and say hello to Mama’s paintings, I head out to the lake ’cause I’ve discovered that for some reason, my brain works better the closer it gets to water. Right off, I open my leather-like up on the picnic table and remove the information card the nurse, Miss Tay Lewis, gave me the last time I was at the hospital. It’s got the afternoon visiting hours noon to two printed on the front. From where the sun’s in the sky, I can tell it’s around ten o’ clock, so that leaves me plenty of time. Whistling Billy’s gone looking for a box to pack Grampa’s things in and Clever’s humming like she doesn’t have a care in the world while she’s watering the roses. Even Keeper, who’s sleeping his hangover off out on the pier, is doing so with a smile on his snout.
But me? Guess you could say I’m only semi-gleeful. Of course, I’m feeling thrilled about Billy and me reuniting. And his believing me. Last night, after a million and one satin kisses, we had bedroll talk. He’s the only one so far that didn’t pshaw me when I told him about finding Mr. Buster dead on Browntown Beach. But there’s another part of me that’s experiencing stomach-churning worry. And it’s not only about Grampa that I’m so worked up. What with all that’s come barreling at me the last coupla days, I haven’t had a bit of time to do any investigating of Mr. Buster’s murder. Sorry, Mama. I can’t write the awfully good story ’fore I solve the crime. And without the story and the resulting admiration beams jetting to heaven, you’re in the exact same position you were in when this all started. Restless.
Done with her chore, Clever hikes herself up on top of the picnic table, a yellow rosebud pinning up her hair. “Whatcha got that weird look on your face for?”
“I’m deep thinkin’.”
“What for?”
When the cottage phone starts clanging, I swing my legs off the bench and say, “Gotta get that. It’s probably Miss Jessie calling from the hospital.”
I’m already halfway up the lawn when Clever yells something excited. I spin around to see what she’s so fired up about at the exact same moment Sheriff LeRoy Johnson steps out from behind a big elm not more’n a yard away from me. “Looks like the lost sheep have finally found their way home,” he says, put out. (One thing I gotta say for the citizenry of Cray Ridge-even though pound for pound most of ’em are what you’d consider fat as hell, they’re light on their feet. Must be from all the hunting they do.)
“Be right back, Sheriff,” I say, trying to scoot around him. “The phone’s ringing off its hook.”
“It’ll wait.” He latches on to my elbow and practically drags me back down to the picnic table. Depositing me next to Clever, he says, “I got a few questions to ask the two of you.”
Oh, I just bet he does. But actually? I don’t have time to mess with him. Taking care of Grampa and Mama are #1 and #2 on my VERY IMPORTANT THINGS TO DO list for the day, so I’m gonna take my chances and tell the sheriff the truth. That we don’t have that stupid treasure map. That Cooter Smith and Sneaky Tim Ray stole it from us, so he should go hunt them down and leave us be. He can’t beat up all of us. Can he?
“Sheriff, about the…,” I try.
“Why’d ya take off into the woods last night?” he asks Clever, ignoring me like I’m part of the landscape. (The reason he’s chosen to give her the third degree instead of me is because he thinks she’s the weakest link. Not finishing high school and all.)
“Ya hear me?” the sheriff asks, bending not more’n four inches from her face, and I’m staggered. Though a lout, LeRoy’s not dumb, and should know by now that getting Clever Lever to cooperate with the law gives new meaning to the word Futile: Useless. The girl’s got the will of a mustang.
I tug on his sleeve. “Sheriff, about…”
“The coloreds burned the dump down last night,” he says, still not taking his hog eyes offa Clever, who’s braiding the ends of her hair and acting all la de da. “And this morning when the smoke cleared, guess who we found in the ashes, burned alive.”
“Who?” I ask, searching around in my briefcase for my blue spiral. This sounds like breaking news!
“Buster Malloy,” the sheriff says.
“WHAT?” I shout. “Why, that’s just-”
“We already got somebody under arrest for that murder.” LeRoy reaches into his pocket and draws out a pouch of Red Man chewing tobacco. “Thought ya might like to know who that somebody is, Carol.”
“Why’d I care who killed Buster? He was nuthin’ but another fat old fart who-”
“Clever!” I scream out before she can say something she’s going to have to pay dearly for.
Hearing my call of distress, Billy barrels out of the cottage, whoaing at my side. And I’m just gettin’ ready to explain what this prevaricatin’ bully just told us, about Mr. Buster Malloy being found dead at the dump, when LeRoy bends back down toward Clever and says in his most taunting voice, “The reason I thought ya’d be interested in who killed Buster is… well.” He pauses to smirk. “It’s a friend of yours we got locked up good and tight.”
“Ya don’t say.” Clever’s returning smirk could win a blue ribbon,because, really, when it gets down to it, me and Billy and Miss Florida and Grampa are the only friends she’s got, and not one of us is sitting down at the sheriff station behind those black bars. “And who might that friend be?” she asks, so sure of herself.
The sheriff slips the chaw behind his lip and says, “Why, that’d be Cooter Smith.”
(Damn it. I forgot about Cooter.)
Clever gasps, and Billy’s struggling to keep his breathing regular and not doing that good a job.
“But that’s not right, that’s not…,” I yell before Billy shakes his head at me ever so slightly, letting me know now’s not the time.
The sheriff says, “We got that uppity boy dead to rights this time. Even got an eyewitness.”
Clearly shaken, but refusing to back down, Clever sasses, “And who’d that be?”
The sheriff looks as smug as a bug in a rug. “Tim Ray Holloway will testify in a court of law that him and Cooter and Buster were playin’ a game of craps over in back of Mamie’s and when the dice didn’t go his way, Cooter lost this temper and beat on Buster ’til he was dead. And threatened he’d do the same to Tim Ray if’n he didn’t help him drag Buster’s body onto the dump so he could set it afire.”
It takes mighty focus for me not to shout out, Why, you lyin’ red-faced baboons! Even though everybody knows that Mr. Buster Malloy had a love of craps, he’s been dead for days already over at Browntown Beach!
Nuts. I bet I know what he did. When I went back to look for Mr. Buster the other afternoon? And I found that he had up and disappeared like Mr. Harry Houdini? The sheriff musta stole him right out from under my nose! And then he dragged that dead body over to the dump for the sole purpose of trying to pin this crime on Cooter Smith because he hates him with his whole heart.
(I believe this would be considered a perfect example of what Mr. Howard Redmond calls in his excellent book: A frame-up: A fraudulent incrimination of an innocent person.)
But ha! on you, sheriff. I got proof Mr. Buster was murdered on that Browntown sand and NOT the dump. I got pictures!
Uh-oh.
Just remembered those shots of Mr. Buster are missing from my stack. Maybe somebody from down at Bob’s Drug Emporium put them in the wrong envelope? Right after my visit to Grampa at the hospital, I’m gonna make a beeline over there.
“Well, been real nice visitin’ with y’all, but I got a prisoner to tend to.” Turning to leave, the sheriff stops with a chuckle. “Just recalled the main reason I came up here in the first place.” Pointing back and forth between me and Clever, he says, “I believe the two of you got something that belongs to that gentleman who lives next door.” He takes out a pad from his back pocket and flips a few pages. “Mr. Willard called down to the station last night to report that he’s missin’ a map of some sort. Said y’all stole it from him.” LeRoy takes a giant step back toward the picnic table, saying, “Ya don’t mind I have a look in your briefcase for it, do ya, Miss Gibby?” Before I can answer, I certainly do, Sheriff, I mind a whole lot, he’s already plucking at one of the leather-like’s compartments with his porky fingers. Then another. Rustling around the bottom, and not finding what he’s looking for, he slams it shut with a lotta show and says to Clever, “Maybe you’s the one hiding that map, Carol.”
“Map? What map?” she says in her most innocent-of-all-wrongdoin’s voice. “I have no idea what you’re talkin’ about.”
“Ya weren’t over at Browntown last night, were ya? Spendin’ the night with the Smith boy? Maybe ya even helped him murder Buster. I know how ya favor the coloreds.” He comes in close enough to sniff Clever, maybe for dump smoke. Or barbecue sauce.
Clever hawks and spits to the side, says, “Why, no I wasn’t, and no I didn’t, LeRoy. Ya know, I could swear I already tol’ you that. Seems to me”-she bobs her eyebrows at me-“what we got here is a failure to communicate.”
Oh, my cool-handed Clever!
“But thanks ever so much for worryin’ about my whereabouts, ” she says so realistically, even I believe her.
Shifting his weight toward me, LeRoy asks, “How about you, Miss Gibby? Ya over to Browntown las’ night?” I can tell he’d love to add on, “You who are dumber than anthracite coal.”
“She was with me,” Billy says, trying to maintain a hold of Keeper, whose appetite must be returning ’cause he’s eyeing the sheriff like he’s a chicken-fried steak.
“And just exactly where was you?” he asks, politing his voice some since Billy’s daddy, Big Bill Brown of High Hopes Farm, is the richest man in Grant County. It’s not likely the sheriff is ready to belly flop into that kind of hot water. Not with an election coming.
Billy says, “I was with Gibby.”
“Sheriff, ya hear anything new about my grampa?” I ask, suddenly remembering. If anybody knows what’s happening over at the hospital, it’d be busybody him.
LeRoy gives us the once-over one more time, and then with a turn of his heel heads back up the lawn.
“Sheriff Johnson?” I call, chasing after him. “Grampa?”
“Gibby?” Billy calls after me, worried.
“I’m fine,” I yell back at him, and then to Clever, “Stay put,” ’cause I can tell she’s just itching to skedaddle.
Hustling, I catch up with LeRoy just as he’s pulling open his cruiser door out back near the road. I’m about to ask him again about Grampa’s condition when he warns, “Keep your trap shut about findin’ Buster on the beach or else.”
OH MY GOODNESS! HE KNOWS I KNOW!
Or is he just warning me about spreading gossip that can’t be proved? Slander: A malicious false statement.
“I’m givin’ you fair warnin’.” He grabs on to a handful of my hair hard enough to wrench my head to my shoulder. “Ya hear?”
“I’ll… I’ll write a story in my newspaper. Everybody in Cray Ridge will know that you’re trying to blame Cooter for something he didn’t do.”
“Be my guest,” LeRoy scoffs. “Who ya think they’re gonna believe? The man who’s been the law of this county for eight years or some… imbecile.”
Seconds after he backs out, siren blaring, Keeper whips past me. He musta been eavesdropping and no longer able to contain himself, ’cause he full-out chases that squad car down Lake Mary Road. “Careful,” I shout after him, even though I know he won’t heed me. That’s the thing with that dog. He’s brave, almost recklessly so, and doesn’t EVER give up. No. Keeper will take it on himself like a sworn duty not to let the sheriff outta his sight. I read the whole book out loud to him, placing special emphasis on chapter 16: Tracking. A good hunting dog can be indispensable. And tenacious. So I’m not worrying about the sheriff’s threats as I turn back to the cottage.
But ya know who should be worried, don’tcha? Cooter Smith, that’s who. Because no matter how rascally he’s been acting lately, we’d all feel real bad if he was found twisting on the end of a rope in Wally’s Woods, the sheriff not bothering to hide a revolting grin when he announces to the town, “He up and escaped. I have no idea who strung the boy up like that. What a goddamn shame.”
Yes, indeed. Cooter Smith should be worryin’ his fool head off.