Paddy Plays in Dead Mule Swamp (16 page)

“Ma’am, is there something wrong?” she
asked.

“No, no. There was, but I think it’s
just been fixed,” I said, getting to my feet. “I’m sorry for
causing a disturbance.”

“No problem. Dogs can be a great
comfort, can’t they?” She smiled.

“They certainly can,” I assured
her.

Paddy woofed in subdued agreement, and
we left the pet store in much better spirits.

I decided I wasn’t going to let
circumstances keep me from talking to John Aho any longer. With
Adele claiming Larry Louama was an unpunished killer, now on the
loose, I wanted to find out about his attack on John. Even though
it had happened long ago, I wanted to know why John hadn’t pressed
charges.

Aho’s Service Station was located on
the south edge of Cherry Hill, and was the type of place one rarely
finds any more. It had not morphed into a convenience store but
really serviced cars, in addition to selling gas and oil. The
parking area was small and was crammed with vehicles apparently
waiting repairs. A two-bay garage beside the cashier’s office was
dark with the grease of several decades. The office wasn’t much
cleaner, but the exterior of the building had been painted white
with blue trim, and someone, perhaps John’s wife, Marie, had filled
blue tubs with bright purple petunias beneath the
windows.

I didn’t see anyone, even though the
doors were all open, but followed the sound of sharp blows on
metal, and a bright flare of light from a drop cord. In this way, I
easily located John, peering up into the undercarriage of a car
which was raised on a hoist. He craned his neck toward
me.

“Ana,” he said. “What can I do for
you?” He set a hammer down on a bench covered with grease-encrusted
tools and wiped his hands on a pink rag. He quipped, “I can adjust
any bolt as soon as I find the right size hammer.”

His grin was infectious, and I smiled.
“Do you have a minute?” I asked. “I see you’re busy. It’s not about
a car problem,” I added.

“There are always cars to be fixed,
but life’s more than broken vehicles. Let’s talk out here in the
light.” He stepped out into the sunshine, blinked and leaned his
rump against the low brick ledge that created a sort of exterior
chair rail around the building.

I’d been thinking about how to
approach this subject, since I wasn’t sure it was common knowledge
that Larry Louama was out of prison. I began, “I’ve been trying to
understand DuWayne Jefferson better. He’s been upsetting Star and
Sunny all week, and I can’t decide if it’s good or bad that he sees
them.”

“Bad,” said John in a flat
voice.

“Well, I sometimes think so too, but
he is their father, and they naturally would like to have a
relationship.”

John shrugged.

I continued, “The person I really want
to ask you about is Larry Louama. I understand that he and DuWayne
were good friends.”

“There’s a train wreck waiting to
happen.”

“How’s that?”

“Those two were in school together at
Emily City High. Larry quit, but DuWayne finished, at least. He
played football.”

“Emily City? I thought the Louamas
lived here in Cherry Hill.”

“They do, but Larry got kicked out of
school here, and his parents rented in a room with someone in Emily
City, and enrolled him over there. Didn’t do any good. The boy had
no use for education. He quit the day he turned
sixteen.”

“So Larry was always in
trouble?”

“Since he was in grade school. And
anyone he associated with couldn’t help but be involved
too.”

“I heard he came after you with a tire
iron.”

“Yup.” John paused and shifted his
weight. “You manage to hear a lot for a newcomer. That’s pretty old
news.”

“I’m not trying to pry. I did start
asking about Angelica, just to be able to talk to the girls without
putting my foot in my mouth.” I grinned. “And people tell me all
kinds of things.”

“That’s probably true
enough.”

“So, do you want to tell me about
it?”

“There’s not much to tell. We used to
have a pop machine back then, and a candy counter. Larry walked
over here one evening, looking to buy a can of pop, but the machine
was out of order. I think he must have been high on something
because he went berserk.”

“What happened, exactly?”

“I was working on some car, Jerry
Caulfield’s actually, as I recall.”

“You remember that?” I was
astonished.

“I do, but you’ll know why in a
minute.”

“Oh, sorry. Go ahead.”

“So, Larry started kicking the pop
machine and cussing me out something fierce. I went out to see what
was going on. There was a tire iron balanced on this ledge, right
over there,” he pointed to the continuation of the ridge he was
leaning on, “and he grabbed it up and started swinging. Broke the
front of the pop machine.”

“Were you here alone?”

“Of course. Never had much use for
hired help. Anyway, I reached back inside here to lay hands on
something myself. I got a hold of a crowbar and we faced off. His
eyes were crazy-like.”

“How big is Larry?”

“Big enough. He wasn’t full-grown
then, but was about my size, and wiry-tough. And on drugs. At
first, he decided not to take me on, but he began to smash windows
and anything he could reach. I was really worried he was going to
dent Caulfield’s Cadillac.”

“Did he?”

“Nope, I got between him and the
garage door, and then he aimed for my head, but I’ve been around
the block a time or two. Done a little martial arts in my day. He
took one big swing, but I just put that crowbar in the right place
and when the tire iron connected with it there was a big ‘twang,’
and Larry let out one huge yelp. The tire iron went flying.” John
had ducked his head, and now looked up at me shyly, clearly proud
of a story he hadn’t had a chance to tell in a long time. “And his
hands stung so bad he couldn’t pick up the baseball cap that had
fallen off his head. He ran off and left it behind. He was just a
kid then. I probably wouldn’t fare so well against him
anymore.”

“Did you press charges?” I asked,
although I’d already been told that he hadn’t.

“Now there’s a funny thing. I wanted
to. I called the police and filed a report right away. I sure
didn’t want to have the insurance turn down my claim for these big
windows.”

“But they wouldn’t let you? That seems
odd.”

“It wasn’t that simple. Cherry Hill
called in the Sheriff’s Department, and they came over with an FBI
agent, of all things.”

“The FBI? Why?”

“The drugs. Apparently Larry was in so
deep, even at sixteen, that they were trying to use him to get to
some of the big distributors.”

“So they didn’t want to send him to a
juvenile home and lose their connections?”

“That’s about the size of it. The
government paid for my windows, and everything was played
down.”

“What became of him?”

“Nothing good. He kept on dealing
drugs—everyone knew that—but he managed to balance on that line
between giving the authorities enough information to keep out of
jail, and continuing to make plenty of money himself. Finally ended
up in state prison for cutting up someone in a fight, downstate.
But he’s out again, so I hear.”

“I’ve been told that, too. I heard a
rumor that connected him with the death of a businessman in Emily
City.”

“Yup. J. Everett Bailey. Different
county, of course, but he was a bit of a celebrity. He gave lots of
money to local causes. Really a big deal when it happened. He was
shot in his own motel. Left on the floor, and he bled
out.”

“Why wasn’t Larry arrested for that,
if he was there?”

“I don’t remember. Probably no
witnesses.”

“But he was with DuWayne the day
Angelica disappeared?”

John nodded. “He sure managed to have
an alibi on an important date.”

“It sounds like they just covered each
other, but why did anyone believe them?”

“That’s a really good question, don’t
you think?”

Chapter 24

Friday dawned clear and surprisingly
cool for July. There were no meetings or pressing errands, and I
hadn’t had a chance to enjoy my new screen porch yet, so I decided
this was the day. There was no furniture in the room, and the walls
were only primed, but while Paddy was out on his cable run I set up
the card table and a folding chair. I owned some of my family
linens, and found a lovely drawn-work tablecloth my grandmother had
made. With a bright-red paper napkin and a blue plate the table
looked festive. I hunted through the silverware drawer to find a
matching set of flatware. Then I made myself a massive vegetable
omelet, a slice of toast, and a pot of coffee.

I brought Paddy in and he pushed his
bony frame past me as I carried the food up the narrow stairs. The
dog was so tall he could see out through the screening even sitting
down. While I ate, he surveyed the trees beyond the yard. He loved
the space as much as I did.

It was mid-summer, and the birds
weren’t singing with the enthusiasm of spring, but robins were
insistently calling “cheeri-up,” and various sparrows twittered. I
heard a blue jay’s accusing, “Thief!” After eating, I brought in a
pile of pillows from my bed and sat leaning against the wall. I was
too low to see anything but branches against the sky, but a light
breeze made the leaves dance, and I sipped coffee and let my mind
wander.

It still mystified me that DuWayne and
Larry hadn’t needed to do more than vouch for each other on the day
Angelica had disappeared. Len had said something about them hauling
sand. I supposed someone at either the pickup or delivery
locations, or both, had seen them a few times. I watched the leaves
and unfocused my eyes. When was Angelica actually killed? That was
the real question. And it couldn’t be answered. No wonder the
alibis weren’t important. Until this week, no one had even been
sure anything had happened to her.

Finding her body made it likely she
had never left the area, but unless someone confessed, it would
probably never be known if she died the day she was walking to
Paula’s Place, or the next day, or even the next. I was no
forensics expert, but I doubted the exact day of death could be
determined after seven years.

And then there was Ralph Garis and his
son, Frank. Why was Ralph interested enough in the discovery of the
body to fight for a seat on our Family Friends Committee? Clearly,
he had come to try to get information rather than to be helpful.
Why had Frank given a note to Adele about Larry being free, instead
of just saying it out loud? If Frank knew Adele at all, he knew
that anything he passed along to her wasn’t going to remain under
wraps. Maybe Ralph had accused Frank of being involved with the
disappearance, and Frank didn’t want to discuss it with his
father.

Who had been the visitor
to the grave site? I couldn’t figure that one out at all. If it had
been a thrill-seeker, why had he or she run away? Fleeing pointed
to someone with guilty knowledge, since they had gone directly to
the correct location. And that could be anyone. Larry, DuWayne,
Frank, even Ralph might have been there, although I couldn’t see
Ralph wearing running shoes. The prints were so obvious, maybe
it
was
Ralph or
someone wearing those distinctive shoes to leave a false clue. I
came to the unhelpful conclusion that it could have been anyone at
all. So far, there was absolutely no way to narrow the field of
suspects since we had no idea who knew how to find Angelica’s
grave.

The sky was warming to a bright clear
blue, and white clouds drifted behind the treetops. I slid down and
snuggled deeper into the pillows. Adele’s ridiculous idea that
Dennis Milford liked me intruded on my efforts to think about
Angelica. Was it possible she was right? If she was, how did I feel
about it? Milford was attractive in a rough sort of way. He
reminded me of George Peppard at the age when he played Banacek on
television, although he didn’t seem to have Banacek’s smooth way
with women. I had enjoyed the reruns of that show, back when I had
cable TV. I’d lived in Dead Mule Swamp for three months and hadn’t
even thought about hooking up my television yet, although I had
brought a small set with me. I had no idea how one got reception
out here; I hadn’t seen a cable box along the road. I supposed I’d
have to get a dish, or an antenna and converter box.

My thoughts continued to jump from one
topic to another. Could Milford show Banacek’s skill in solving
cases, and find Angelica’s killer? If Adele was right, did I want
to date someone yet? That answer was a definite “no.” Having one
solid fact was like a corner fencepost. Maybe I could build from
there.

I debated teal or plum for my accent
wall. No answer for that question. I pondered whether DuWayne was
harmless but insensitive or dangerous and threatening. No fence
post there either.

“Let’s go for a walk,” I proposed to
the dog.