An Unmarked Grave (29 page)

Had the situation been reversed, if Jim Bob had been fooling around with Marv's wife, I would have figured that was
more than motive enough. But not the other way around.

Still, Nora Talley had identified him. That told me that,
somehow, he had played a major role in Houston's disappearance.

Thirty minutes later, I shook my head and leaned back in
my chair wearily.

The human mind is strange and mysterious. I don't know
if it's true that we only utilize about ten percent of its capacity (and I probably use even less), but I do know that for
me it is difficult at times to make that sucker go where I
want it to.

Motive was what I sought. What could have prompted
Marv Lewis to kill Jim Bob Houston? I could find nothing.
Maybe I was looking in the wrong place or at the wrong person. I was still convinced that whoever murdered Houston
had also killed Justin. The motive for Chester's death was
simple. The killer didn't want Houston's body discovered.

At least I had Sheriff Perry on my side.

At breakfast, I got my first shock of the morning when
a grim-looking Buck Ford strode in and made straight for
our booth, brushing ice off the shoulders of his wool mackinaw.

He stopped and looked down. "Morning, boys. Mind if I
join you?"

I started to scoot over, but he reached around and pulled
a chair up to the end of the table. I introduced him to Jack.
"You're out early"

His face remained grim. He glanced at Jack, then cut his
eyes back to me.

I nodded. "He knows everything."

With a grunt, Ford rested his elbows on the table and stared straight into my eyes. "I got it from a good source. Watch
your back. Whatever you're nosing into, someone don't
like it." He hastened to add, "I don't know any more than
that. All I was told last night was to warn you that someone
don't like your snooping around, and they reckon on stopping you"

Leaning back, I eyed him narrowly. "This source. Who
is it?"

He pursed his lips. "He's my cousin. That's all I'll tell
you, but he overheard talk that you were getting too close,
and something needed to be done about you"

I stared after Ford as he left the restaurant, wondering
just which one of the townsfolk was his cousin. If Elysian
Hills was like most small communities, it could be anyone.

Jack glanced up at me uneasily. "You think he was serious, Tony?"

I was convinced then that Ford had no part in either murder. Slowly I nodded. "As cancer"

As we started up the stairs to our room, I suddenly froze,
remembering the zip code on my Target bill. Prior to the
fifties, most communication was by mail. Mom, as did her
mother, saved every letter from family members. I remembered looking at the faded envelopes, curious, and asking
why zip codes were on our envelopes today and not on the
old ones. Mom had smiled. "We didn't have them then, son"

An idea struck me. I bounded up the stairs.

Behind me, Jack was yelling, "What's wrong, Tony?
What's wrong?"

In our room, I booted up the computer and pulled up zip codes on a search engine. My heart thudded in my chest.
The first use of the five-digit zip code was in 1963. The ninedigit came in 1986.

I pulled out the deed I had copied up in Montague County
at the courthouse.

There, at the bottom of the deed contract, was the notarized statement of Pearl Ragsdale, P.O. Box 749, Elysian
Hills, Texas, 76251-4963 verifying the legality of the signatures. What jumped out at me was the date, November 23,
1985, two months before the nine-digit zip code went into
effect.

The document was forged!

I must have exploded in a string of gleeful cursing, for Jack
hurried over to me. "What's wrong, Tony? Huh? What is it?"

I pointed to the screen. "We've got him nailed, Jack. Marvin Lewis" I tapped my middle finger on the sales document. "This is a forgery"

He frowned at me.

I was so excited, I was shaking. "All right. Let me explain
what took place. For whatever reason, Marvin Lewis killed
Jim Bob Houston in 1986. That's when Houston disappeared.
I'm going to guess in March, because that's when the deed
was filed. Lewis buried him in the empty spaceman's grave,
had the contract drawn up, notarized, and filed, rented a
room in Chicago under Houston's name, and put money in
the bank in Houston's name. Two years later, he let Houston
vanish. Where Pearl Ragsdale made her mistake notarizing
the document was using the nine-digit zip code that had gone
into effect two months earlier."

Jack frowned. "I don't follow you"

I drew a deep breath. "All right. Look, in January of eighty six, a nine-digit zip code went into effect. Okay? Using it
had become habit for the notary, Pearl Ragsdale. So much
of a habit, in fact, that when she backdated the sales contract to November of the previous year, she forgot to use
only the five-digit zip in effect at that time. Now do you follow me?"

Jack's brow knit. "I'm no genius, but couldn't someone
get into a bunch of trouble backdating documents like that?"

I laughed. I don't know if it was at his remark, or I was
so giddy over my discovery. "No idea. Maybe"

"Then why do it?"

"Think about it," I replied, looking at the note card I had
made on Pearl Ragsdale. "What's she got to lose? She's dying. Her forty-year-old son has to have special care to survive. She lived just down the road from Lewis. He knew
her problems. He knew she had to have money, so he told her
that if she would alter the dates, he would take care of her
son, Ollie, after her death by placing him in St. Christopher's
in Fort Worth. She has nothing to lose and everything to
gain. And with the contract, Lewis tied up Houston's disappearance in a neat little package. You'll pardon me for saying
so, it was a match made in heaven"

Jack nodded and muttered, "Or hell"

Turning back to my notes, I jotted down my information,
after which I pulled up the St. Christopher's Web site. Tuition began at six hundred a month, probably a third that
sum back in the eighties. On impulse, I called St. Christopher's. Under the pretext of searching for heirs to mineral
rights, I learned that Oliver Ragsdale, who had entered school
in June 1986, was deceased. Date, November 2, 1996, at age
fifty-two.

I studied the document, trying to sort my thoughts into a
logical chronology. If it were filed in March 1986, chances
were, that was when Houston was killed-the same month
the apartment was rented from Homer and Nora Talley in
Evanston. Ragsdale notarized the document that month,
backdating it to November of 1985. Three months after notarizing it, she passed away, and Marvin Lewis saw to it
that little Ollie was placed at St. Christopher's.

Elated, I picked up the phone to call Sheriff Perry, but at
the last moment I hesitated when my glance fell onto one of
my note cards. I picked it up. It was about one of the first
conversations I had had with Marvin Lewis. At the time of
Justin's death, claimed Lewis, he was at his brother's in
Gainesville, northeast of Elysian Hills.

On impulse, I drew up the white pages online, and, to my
dismay, there were over thirty Lewises in Gainesville. I
went back to my note cards and with a sigh of relief found
the brother's name, Benjamin.

There were no Benjamins, but there were three B. Lewises.
On the second call, I got the right one. I told him I was Joe
Ragsdale, an old friend of Marvin's. "I tried him at home,
and there was no answer. Then I remembered at the end of
last month, he was out of town. Someone said he might have
gone to your place for a visit. I thought he might be there
now, with the holidays coming up"

"Sorry, Mr. Ragsdale. He isn't here. I haven't seen my
brother since last Christmas. It's shame, you know. Families
aren't close like they used to be"

"I know, Mr. Lewis. Thanks anyway. Sorry to bother you"

With a grin as wide as the Colorado River, I punched
off my cell and looked at Jack. "I think we got something." Before Jack could ask, I continued. "Lewis told me he was
visiting his brother the day Justin died. He lied. Now, why
would he lie?"

"Simple. Because he did it."

I dialed the sheriff's number, but he was out.

I grabbed my jacket. "Let's go"

After the cut brake lines, I made a routine habit of pumping the brakes hard every time I climbed behind the wheel.
It's a mighty uneasy feeling flying down the road at fifty or
sixty miles an hour and slamming on the brakes only to have
them go to the floor.

The weather had turned miserable; the low gray clouds
dropped a steady drizzle of ice. It was the kind of day that
called for a warm fire and a smooth drink.

Halfway to Elysian Hills, I spotted Perry's cruiser coming toward us. When he saw my Silverado, he pulled off the
shoulder and climbed out. I parked on the shoulder across
the road from him.

Bundled in a heavy, fur-collared nylon jacket, he hurried
across the road, slapping his arms to keep the blood flowing.

I rolled the window down. "I tried to call you"

Turning his shoulder into the falling drizzle, he shouted,
"Yeah? What about?"

"I have proof that the deed for Houston's land was a forgery. And I can prove that Lewis was not at his brother's
like he claimed when Justin Chester was killed. It looks
like Lewis killed Chester to keep him from digging up the
spaceman's grave, where, twenty years earlier, he'd buried
Jim Bob Houston"

"What about Buck Ford?"

I shrugged. "I was wrong"

Perry studied me for a moment. "All right. How do you
figure Marv managed all that?"

Suddenly, my brain started clicking. "He must have killed
Justin during the day, maybe up at his house, or in Justin's
room. Struck him on the back of his head. Then, after dark,
he drove him out to the creek and sent the pickup toward the
water, but it hit the tree and bounced off." I remembered
the stench of gasoline in the pickup. "He probably figured it
would crash and burn, but it didn't. That's when Buck spotted it"

The sheriff eyed me suspiciously. "So why didn't Buck
spot Marv?"

I grimaced, then remembered the car tracks leading behind the patch of shinnery. The words rushed from my lips.
"Like Buck said, it was dark. Lewis had parked his car behind the shinnery patch. He waited back there until Buck
left to notify you, then headed in the other direction"

Pursing his lips, the sheriff replied, "Okay. Tell me. How
did Marv manage to get his car and the pickup out there if
he was the only one driving?"

His question stumped me. I had eliminated Ford and
Perry. Who was left? "I don't know. But he had help"

"Who?"

I blew out through my lips. "I told you. I don't know.
Someone here in Elysian Hills. You know these people better than I do"

Perry blinked and shook his head slowly. "You think
that's the way it was, huh?"

"Makes sense, through I could be wrong. However, I am
certain about the deed and Lewis' brother"

"Well, you'd better be, because that Talley woman in
Chicago had a heart attack last night. She died this morning. That's what I was coming to tell you"

Igroaned.

He looked up at the weather. "Look. This stuff's going to
get worse. Get on back to the motel. I'll get in touch with
you this afternoon, and we'll decide where to go from here"

I studied him for a moment. "I want to clean up a couple
of things in town. Won't take long. We'll be at the motel
when you call"

For a moment, his eyes flashed, then he nodded. "All
right, but take care on these roads. They'll start icing over
directly. You've already been through one fence" He chuckled. "Don't try for two.

cicles dangled from the eaves of Sam Fuqua's convenience
store. The parking lot was empty. We jumped out of the
pickup and scurried into the warmth of the small business.

Sam greeted us with a broad smile and a gesture at the
coffeepot.

Pouring a mug of his own, he joined us in front of the
space heater. "Terrible day," he muttered with a shiver.
"Never no business on days like this. Once I started to close
early on one of these days, but a man, he came in. He run out
of gas down the road. So, I tell myself never to close early.
You never can tell when someone might come in."