Combustible (A Boone Childress Novel) (13 page)

Hoyt shook his head. “Ler
oy’s dead and buried two years at least.”

“Dead?”
Abner said, sounding shocked. “You sure?”

“I
was a pall bearer.” Hoyt waited long enough to let the news sink in. “And I’m going to have to pass on your offer, considering past history with this department. We’ll be contacting Dr. Windsor-Smith down at the university. She’s a crackerjack young forensic expert.”

Boone
broke into the conversation. "Are you going to arrest Eugene Loach?"

"
Eugene Loach?" Hoyt drew back his chin. "What for? He didn't start this fire."

"Maybe he didn't,"
Boone said. "But he did refuse to render aid to a victim, and that victim died in the fire. That makes him a killer in my book."

"You ain't
old enough to have a book, son."

"This stinks, Hoyt.
"

Hoyt turned to walk away.
"Then don't breathe through your nose."

Boone jumped in front of him. "Why won't anybody listen to me?
We had to find the body ourselves before anyone even believed there was a victim. Now you're telling me that you're not investigating the most obvious suspect?"

"All I'm telling you is to get out of my way." Hoyt
pulled his leather belt higher on his gut. "Be glad you're a vet, Boone. Else your ass would be sitting in my prowler, handcuffed to an O-ring. Now excuse me, I got to go play with the grownups for a while."

Hoyt waited until Boone stepped aside and then called for
a deputy. Boone watched him put on a pair of sunglasses and pull out a cellphone. What a pompous, officious, over-bearing, patronizing—

"Jack
ass," Abner said.

"
I'm not letting it go," Boone said. He swallowed, and his throat felt like he had gargled sand. He was going to find out who set the fire, and no expert, including the sheriff, Lamar, or that officious deputy, was going to stop him.

A
rural ambulance sounded its siren behind them. Boone watched as it rolled up the driveway and then bounced over the ground. Its wheels sank in a soft area for a moment. The driver gunned the engine and after a couple of seconds of slinging sand, it was free. The EMTs jumped out of the back and carried a gurney toward the house. One of the deputies with the body bag waved them over.

Boone
turned his attention back to his grandfather. Abner looked like he had been slapped. Boone hooked him by the arm and walked them both toward Hoyt.

“You’ve
got to be shitting me,” Boone said, after calling Hoyt’s name. “He found the body, and you don’t want his help anymore?”

“Deputy,”
Hoyt said to Mercer, who was still at his shoulder taking notes, “escort Boone and Dr. Zickafoose to their vehicle."

“
What if I decide not to leave?” Boone said.

Mercer
stowed his notebook and began walking toward him, arms wide, as if he were a human lariat about to wrangle them.

“Son,”
Hoyt said, “after thirty-two years on the job, I got no sense of humor left, so I do not kid around. Go on, before I have to call your mama.”

Boone
ground his teeth until he felt the tendons working in his jaw. Why would a firefighter refuse to offer aid? There had to be an explanation for it, but his mind was too scattered to sort it all out.

“Keep
walking,” Mercer said. He was on their heels the whole way.

Boone
turned around. “There’s no speed limit for walking.”

Mercer
reached for the Taser on his belt. His face fell, though, as his hand groped the empty holster. Over in the debris, the Taser lay on the box springs, covered in plaster dust and soot.

Poetic justice
, Boone thought. He took Abner by the arm again. “Come one, Doc. They don’t want us here.”

But
Boone knew they would later. Nobody was better at human identification than Abner Zickafoose, and Boone knew that there was no way he was turning his back on the woman in the house, no matter who she turned out to be.

When she came home early and found Boone in the barn instead of resting in bed, Mom sounded like a cat that had been dropped down a well. She stood between him and the shelves that held his research project, which consisted of over three dozen mason jars containing the flesh of dead animals. The mouth of each jar was covered with wire mesh of varying size.

"
What are you doing out of bed?” Mom yelled.

“C
harting the effects of certain insect larvae on decaying flesh.”

“Where’s Cedar?
I can't believe you've conducting this research in my barn. You know how I feel about desecrating the dead."

"
I got bored, and Cedar can’t be here for a couple hours,” Boone said. “And they're dead animals, not people."

"And
I'm a veterinarian, so it's just as bad to me. Killing animals for research is unethical and unacceptable."

"You put down horses."

"It's part of my job, and I’m not going to justify it to you. Understand?"

He did, but that didn't stop him from wanting to argue semantics.
In truth, he needed something to calm his nerves after he and Abner got back from the Nagswood site. Charting data helped him rein in his random thoughts, to reshape them in his head the way that a magnet realigns atoms.

"It's
road kill, Mom. The only thing I hurt was the turkey buzzards' choice of snacks."

With
the increase of traffic around the new developments, there were plenty of animals to be found along the highway. It wasn't like he wanted the poor animals to be dead.

"You're
a terrible child."

"Cedar
says that you're transferring your negative feelings for Dad onto to Abner. She read about in
Psychology Today
last week."

"Cedar
is a lovely young woman."

"
Yes, she is.”

"Who
should stick to her studies instead of psycho analyzing a middle-aged woman’s relationships with their unreliable, single-minded, inconsiderate elderly parents. I also suggest better reading material.
Cosmo
, for example. They have nice quizzes."

"Essay or multiple choice?"

"Ha, ha." She peered over Boone's shoulder as he dumped a sample on a metal tray. With a probe, he counted the number of blow fly larvae present.

"Ugh
,” she said. “In the 80's, we used the word gnarly to described things that disgusting."

“Disgusting, as in big hair
heavy metal bands?"

"Very
funny."

Boone
carefully returned the bugs and the tissues to the jar. "This is important information, Mom. One day, police will be able to use my data to accurately determine the date of death of an individual."

"You
sound like your grandfather."

"And
that’s a bad thing?" Abner said, stepping from the field and into the barn. His hair was helter-skelter, his collar bent up on one side. His pants, which were already wrinkled, looked like that they had been twisted up like rope. "I happen to like his grandfather."

"
Dad," Mom said, after she caught her breath. "I didn't know you were there."

"Would
it have changed what you said about me?"

"Not
one bit. You know how I feel about your research and your disregard for simple human dignity. You treat people like pieces of meat."

Oh,
no, Boone thought, here they go. Mom's dislike of Abner's profession was no family secret. She wasn't shy about it to begin with and lately, she had begun to see herself as something of a crusader, now that she had the extra income and status that owning the largest veterinarian office in Stanford. That included being quoted several times in magazine articles, especially one that
Parade
magazine once did, about her belief that forensic anthropology was at best a ghoulish hobby.

But
Abner surprised Boone. He pulled his hair back in a ponytail and stroked his beard a couple of times as he scanned the specimens. "Boone, did you tell your mama what you and me did this morning?"

Boone
let the clipboard slip between his fingers. "This morning?"

"Mary
Harriett," Abner said, rubbing the back of his neck and looking blanched, like a man who would rather eat the contents of the jars than to confess, "there's something I've got to tell you."

He
spilled the whole story. The trip to the Nagswood house. The discovery of the body. While he was explaining without going into the truly gory details, Mom turned to Boone with tears misting in her eyes and hugged him.

Since
she was almost a foot shorter, he had to bend down, and that strained his ribs. He grunted, and she patted his back in sympathy, which made him grunt again.

"
Sprained neck, Mom."

"Tough."

"One more hug, and I'm going to need traction."

Abner
went on to add the story of the sheriff and Mercer chasing them away. What Abner left out was the fact that after they got back to the house, he had Boone scrape the end of the hooligan tool clean and put the particles he gathered into plastic evidence bags. The bags were now labeled and stored in the glove compartment of the Range Rover.

"My
god," Mom said when Abner was finished. She sat down on one of the straw bales. She pressed the knuckle of her index finger under her nose. Boone had seen her do this many times. It was to keep from fainting. "That poor woman. Does anyone know who she is?"

“Not yet,”
Abner said.

Boone
added, "Nobody even knew she was there, so they didn't bother to investigate."

"I
can see why. Who owns the house now?" Mom said.

"Some corporation. But it used to belong to
a local band teacher," Abner said.

"Troy Blevins?"
Mom asked.

Boone
nodded. "He sold it at auction two weeks ago." He reached for another jar, and the sudden movement sent a shock of pain spiking through his back. The meds were wearing off, but he could handle pain.

"Sit,"
Mom told him. When he had complied, mostly because he thought he might pass out if he stayed on his feet, she patted his knee. "I'm on the horns of a dilemma. On one hand, I'm sorry that a woman had to die in that fire because nobody believed you. I'm glad that those banged up ribs weren’t wasted on stupidity. You did a good thing finding that person. Now, she can be laid to rest properly."

"Thanks,"
Boone said.

Mom
took a deep breath. She shuddered and wiped her eyes. Anyone else would have expected her to break down, but Boone knew his mother. This wasn’t a breakdown, and it wouldn't last long.

"Now,
Mary Harriett," Abner said, obviously sensing a shift in Mom's mood. "Don't be so fussy. I was the one that took him there in the first place."

"A
fact that I very well aware of. You’ve betrayed my trust. Both of you." She stood and walked to the window of the barn. For three seconds, she watched the horses nickering near the fence. Then she walked back to them, shaking a finger at them. "Abner, I left my son in your care. You said you’d bring him home.”

"I
did."

"Taking
him to a forensic investigation on the way from the hospital doesn’t fit my definition of home! And you, Daniel Boone Childress, you were told to get plenty of bed rest. Instead, I find you out here in the barn.”

She
went on for several more minutes. By the time she finished, Boone's ears felt scorched, Abner was looking for a way of escaping, and Lamar was coming up the path. Ball cap tugged down to his brow, the visor hiding his eyes, he took measured strides that told Boone he was angry and trying to control it.

Lamar
stopped at the entrance of the barn, his body silhouetted in the doorframe, at the same moment Mom stuck out a hand and demanded the contents of Boone's wallet.

"My
what?" Boone said, taken aback because he had been paying more attention to Lamar.

Mom snapped her fingers.
"Your driver's license. You're too injured to drive. Hand it over."

“Not happening, Mom, and don’t even think of trying to ground me.”

"Then I reckon I’ll have to." Lamar left his place in the doorframe as Mom walked over to him. She started to explain what was going on, but Lamar waved her off. "I heard all about it, Mary Harriett. Every firefighter in the county knows. Boone, did I not put you on probation?"