Eleven Little Piggies (24 page)

‘Yup. They agree with Doris's story right down the line,' Andy said.

‘And all the physical evidence supports that story,' Ray said.

‘“Waited by break”.' Andy was reading again, ‘“shooed off horses twice. Waited over an hour, finally decided to jury-rig a mend”.

‘I asked them, how'd you do that without any supplies? and Charlie said, “Times like that is when you need an Elmer along”, and they both kind of chortled. This old guy, Elmer Hisey, who they say has lived on that farm since about the Hoover administration, has built or mended every yard of fence on that place, many times over. So he knows all the places where they left a little coil of extra wire around a post, and he has some hidey-holes under rocks where he keeps a pickle jar or tobacco can with a few nails and staples. And when it comes time to hammer in a staple, he says, “nothin' wrong with usin' a boot-heel”.'

‘There,' Andy said, as Ray logged off. ‘Made it by quitting time, by Jimminy.' He laughed. ‘See, I spent the afternoon with those farmers, now I'm talking like them.'

‘Sounds like you kind of enjoyed it,' I said.

‘Yeah. I worked for guys like that, summers when I was in high school. Great kidders but they'd work you to death and not even notice. They were just so
strong
from working all the time;
they didn't get tired when I did.' He thought a minute, sitting with his hands on his knees. ‘That Elmer, you know . . . Charlie says he's almost illiterate, barely can sign his name. But they all agree he's a genius with the animals, he can get them to do what he wants with nothing but a little cluck and a nudge now and then. And he knows all kinds of canny little survival tricks, like that fence-mending caper. Ways to make do with whatever you got. We hardly even grow people like him in this country anymore.'

He sighed and stood up. ‘Good news and bad, I guess.' He laughed out loud again, a gusty bark. ‘Charlie says Elmer's favorite TV show is
Dancing With the Stars
.'

T
he drive home was a pleasure Friday night, with my cheerful son crowing and waving at birds behind me. He had two fine white teeth growing on his lower front jaw; he was pain-free and had glimpsed a life beyond pablum. Untold flavors of crackers and cookies waited, on his horizon, to be reduced to soggy pulp. He was ready to share some joy.

Trudy had apple sauce and a bottle for him and a plea for me. ‘I know all the bad jokes by heart but can you please put up with leftovers tonight? I am way too beat to cook.'

‘Leftovers are the one part of turkey dinner I like,' I said. ‘Sit here and enjoy the boy. I am a whiz at taking dishes out of the refrigerator.' To prove it I slid out a big platter of turkey parts, double-wrapped in yards of aluminum foil. ‘Wow, did we think this bird was still trying to run away?' As I unwrapped the bird, the smell of dressing reached my nostrils and greed took over my soul. Dressing is so much better the second day! ‘Why are you so tired?' I asked her, picking shamelessly at morsels. ‘Something go wrong at work?'

‘No. I guess it's just let-down. Yesterday was kind of . . . large.'

‘And you worked so hard at it because I had to run out on you. You were a real champ about that, did I thank you?'

‘Five times at least. Have we got anything left in the house to drink?'

‘Trust me.' I went and found the bottle of Shiraz I had hidden in the cellar. While we sipped the first glass we debated the relative merits of the microwave versus the toaster oven for reclaimed dressing and turkey parts.

‘Actually I kind of like it cold,' I finally confessed, eating some more of it cold. ‘Don't you? And then we could finish off that apple pie with some cheese.'

When Ben finished his bottle I put him in the high chair with a couple of spoons, and he practiced his pounding and throwing while he watched us eat. I let him try tiny nibbles of this and that – he felt so-so about dressing, thought Mamie Carlson's mashed sweet potatoes had some merit, and threw cheddar cheese on the floor with a look that said I had to be kidding.

When the phone rang I said, ‘Tell me that's your mother, wanting to recap yesterday while I put away these dishes.'

‘Let us hope,' she said. She answered it, made a face and handed it to me, saying, ‘Ray.'

‘I'm at Methodist ER,' he said. ‘Winnie called me because Doris called her—'

‘Since when,' I said, ‘is Winnie taking the calls for detective division?'

‘Oh, they kind of bonded, you know, after Owen . . . just listen, OK? Doris Kester called Winnie and said, “I know I shouldn't bother you at home but you said if there was ever anything you could do . . .” Long story short, Doris just brought that old guy named Elmer in here. Charlie Blaise found him in a stall unconscious.'

‘And she thinks we take accident calls?'

‘The docs here are trying everything to resuscitate but Charlie thinks any minute they're going to pronounce him DOA. And the thing is, Jake, the way Charlie found him in a stall, it looks like he got kicked by the horse that was in there with him. But Charlie insists that's crazy, says no way does Elmer ever get kicked by any horse, but especially not that old brood mare that he has known and fussed over for almost twenty years.'

‘So if Elmer makes it we'll be looking to prove assault?'

‘And if he doesn't I'm going to call Pokey and try to take charge of the body right away, because Charlie is positive somebody beat his head in.'

‘Let me know which one happens,' I said. ‘I'm going to get on the phone with the chief right now. Because either way, we've got to get somebody out there to isolate that stall and sequester whatever we find there.'

‘What about overtime, is it—'

‘I'll have to get authorization for it. And . . . is Charlie Blaise still there?'

‘Oh, sure. He wouldn't think of leaving till he finds out how Elmer's doing.'

‘May I speak to him, please?'

The foreman's voice, when he came on, was steady but subdued. ‘H'lo?'

I said, ‘Jake Hines here, Charlie. Sorry about your trouble.'

‘Mmm.'

‘Is the animal still in that stall?'

‘Yeah, I didn't dare take the time to change her – anyway I thought you'd want to see it . . . the way it was.'

‘Good thinking.'

‘But as I told Ray here, I'm sure old Bessie didn't do this. That horse and Elmer was like best friends.'

‘I understand. When I can get somebody out there, will he be able to get in the barn?'

‘Yes.' He described the location and markings of the stall. ‘I'll help you all I can later on, but . . . I kind of want to stick here till I see how it's going with Elmer.'

‘Of course. Is Doris there with you?'

‘Yes. You want to talk to her?'

‘Not necessarily. Just tell her not to be surprised if and when she finds our vehicles in her yard.' I punched off, dialed McCafferty and caught him at home on a rare night with no meetings.

He said, ‘Never mind the money, Jake, I'll squeeze some more shoes and get it. Something very bad is going on with this family, isn't it? Are you getting any closer to knowing what the hell it is?'

‘I'm beginning to think so. But I better tell you about it later because I got about a hundred things to do right now.'

Trudy was watching me as I closed my phone. ‘I hate to do this to you,' I said.

She waved me off, saying, ‘I am a whiz at putting dishes back in the refrigerator.' She watched me carefully gearing up, checking my Glock and my Taser, putting an extra clip of ammo in a pocket and settling my jacket over my vest. ‘It's getting a little hairy, isn't it?'

‘We damn sure need to get it stopped,' I said. ‘But don't worry. I'll just be supervising and we probably can't do much tonight anyway.'

‘Good. I'll be right here, not worrying. So keep in touch when you can, will you?'

‘You bet.' I called Ray again, because I was waffling about where to go first. He said the ER team had just called time of death on Elmer, and Pokey was on his way.

‘I'm on my way in too.'

‘Good. Andy just got here, too,' Ray said. ‘He said, “You don't need to time me in – I just wanted to be here”.'

‘How'd he hear about it?'

‘Um . . . Winnie called him. She knew how he felt about Elmer.'

They were all together in the waiting room, Ray and Winnie, Andy and Charlie, clustered around Doris. To my surprise the silent boy, Alan, was with her, sitting close to his mother but not touching. I raised my eyebrows and Winnie whispered, ‘He was getting too anxious so her mother brought him back.'

Then Pokey was there, all business, no time to talk to us until he had made his deal with the attending physicians. He wanted to stake his claim, ‘get my body moved to County right away', I heard him saying in the curtained enclosure. He had been lucky enough to find a room open at County Medical, had a van coming to transport and was anxious to examine what was left of Elmer Hisey before anybody else laid a hand on him.

It's one of his big concerns, the reason he gladly endures freezing in a field the way he did at Owen Kester's crime scene. He hates the loss of information he faces on a body that's been treated in a hospital. ‘So much washing and disinfecting,' he told me once. ‘Good for patient maybe. Big loss for me.'

He let us in, for a minute, while he waited for his driver. We stood in a row a careful three feet from the gurney, an odd group painfully aware we didn't belong together. The body on the gurney looked shriveled, ancient, abstract – like a less-than-lifesize impression of a man, made by an artist whose skills needed work. It was hard to believe he had recently been the busy, useful person everybody was already describing.

‘First time I ever saw him not smiling,' Winnie murmured.

‘He was kind to everything,' Doris said. ‘Even the cats loved him.'

‘Because he always brought them milk,' Charlie said. ‘Elmer was the best hand with a sick animal I ever saw.'

‘And the newborns,' Doris said. ‘He'd hold them and he could seem to feel what they needed.' She gave vent to a long, sad sigh. ‘I'm going to
miss
him.'

Amazingly, it was still only eight o'clock when they wheeled the gurney out to the van. Ray and I had walked out with Pokey, and stood beside him as the driver slammed the big back door and drove away. Pokey said he had time now and the lab was available, so he thought he'd go ahead with the autopsy ‘soon as I can scrub in'.

I said, ‘Pokey, isn't two in one day kind of too much?'

He looked at me as if the question was too lame to deserve an answer. Nodding brightly to Ray, he said, ‘Whoever's coming, better be quick.'

When he was gone I told Ray, ‘Whoever you give it to is going to log considerable overtime – why not assign the person who wants it most?'

‘You mean Bo? Good idea.' He pulled out his phone.

‘One thing before you start that – I think we should take a look in that stall tonight before time changes it any more, don't you?'

‘Absolutely.'

‘So while you call Bo shall I go see if Andy's free to go along?'

‘Sure. Winnie too, if she's still up for it. She should know that place pretty well by now – she and Rosie have spent more time there than anybody. So now,' he began to punch buttons, ‘let's see if I can find Bo. He and Rosie are kind of all over the place right now; they found a house to move into together and they're—' Somebody answered one of the numbers he had punched, and his voice took on an unnatural sweetness. Must be Nelly, I thought, and as I walked away I heard him say, ‘Hi, honey, this is Ray Bailey. Is your dad there?'

Back in the waiting room I caught Andy's eye and then Winnie's, nodded toward the door, and stepped into the hall to wait for them. Standing in the harsh light of the cold, busy corridor, getting nudged and poked by busy people carrying bulky objects, I told him, ‘I just got authorization from the chief for as many overtime hours as we need for this case. Ray and I think we ought to take a look in that barn before time changes it any more. You up for it tonight?'

‘You bet,' Andy said, and Winnie nodded emphatically.

‘OK, you're on the clock starting now. You got all your gear with you?'

‘In the car,' they both said, then looked at each other in surprise and laughed.

‘The way things have been going,' Andy said, ‘I just try to stay prepared.'

I went inside to make sure Doris and her foreman were on board with this decision. They both endorsed the idea and offered to help. Ray and I held a private intense conversation in the hall about the pros and cons of accepting their offer.

‘It's not exactly kosher, is it?' he said, all his long face screwed into pondering knots. ‘Officially they're still on my list of suspects.'

‘But we don't know the layout,' I said, ‘or the animals. And it's night.'

‘Yeah. Let's do what works and fix it with the rule book later.'

We all got busy with prep, then bought fresh bottles of water from one vending machine, energy bars from another. Ray had a cache of flashlight batteries that he shared around. Winnie went out to her car to check her weapons and armor, and came back in carrying a half-dozen printouts of Maynard's picture, which she scattered around the room, saying, ‘Might as well put every location to use.'

Doris and Charlie got into her big SUV to go home, saying they would meet us at the barn and show us anything we wanted to see. There was no more mutual suspicion now – we were all on the same team. Even Alan, who was always, quietly but insistently, by his mother's side, seemed less alien than before.

We followed them in a caravan of our own cars – not efficient, but we all wanted to be prepared to go home from there without coming back to the station to check out cars. It was a clear, bright night – after we passed the last lights from gas stations and C-Stores, we could see many stars.