Grave Undertaking (5 page)
“Bird dogs?” I asked. I scribbled the word under
Christmas
and wondered if Uncle Wayne had gotten the message confused and this man was trying to sell me something.
“Yes sir, because that’s what I am. Hoffman Enterprises pays me to spot what they’re hunting. I’m a pointer. When I see something I like, I point it out to them.”
“So they can shoot me?” I laughed, although being in the funeral business had already gotten me shot once.
“I don’t want this to come out wrong, but I know a little bit about your situation. Four years ago, we looked into bringing Clayton and Clayton into our company. I was the bird dog and I liked what I saw.”
“I never heard about it. Did you speak with my father?”
“No, it never went that far. At the time, we had just come through a major expansion and capital funds were tight. We had to get the operation phase of our new acquisitions under control. And, frankly, the situation in Gainesboro worried us.”
“Too small?”
“Too unstable. We knew about your father’s illness, and although we could have approached you with a price favorable to us, the management team was leery of picking up a property with uncertain operational variances.”
The phrase was so corporate sounding I didn’t bother to write it down. “What’s that mean?”
“Barry, Hoffman Enterprises is a business. We utilize all of the strategic and managerial tools available to operate at a fair profit.”
“Right, so why didn’t you make a fire-sale offer when you learned my father had Alzheimer’s?”
“Because that wasn’t the issue. You were the issue.”
“Me?”
“Yes. I may have a string of degrees and years of business experience, but I also understand the uniqueness of our industry. I’m a second son.”
“Second son?” The man was losing me in a conversation of meaningless phrases.
“You’re an only child, Barry. You’ve probably never heard of what I call second son syndrome. My family ran a funeral home in Irondale, Alabama. I was the second son, and there wasn’t enough business to support two families, even though at the time I wanted the home more than anything. My brother was older by ten years, he made a buy-sell arrangement with my father, and I got tuition money for Harvard Business School instead.”
Want more than anything
went on my pad.
“So I know a funeral home is about relationships with the community,” continued Sandiford. “There was no continuity we could see at Clayton and Clayton. You had taken a different path.”
“And that made a difference?”
“Absolutely. Our business model is to buy family funeral homes, keep the family as employees, and run the business with the efficiencies of a large corporation able to buy equipment, supplies, and services at discount volume.”
Wal-Mart has come to the funeral business, I thought, except the people saying “Welcome to Wal-Mart” are all kinfolk.
“Without that family link,” said Sandiford, “we decided we couldn’t afford to take a chance on re-staffing while we had so many other operations in transition.”
“What’s changed?” I asked. I drew a line across the page, figuring we were getting to the heart of the matter. There was a knock on the door behind me. “Hold on a second,” I told Sandiford. I tore off the sheet and stuck it in the magazine just as Mom came in with a plate of toasted English muffins.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were on the phone. You never made your muffins.” She set the food on the magazine beside me and retreated. I waited until her footsteps faded down the hall.
“Go ahead, Mr. Sandiford.”
“Ted, please. A couple things changed. Four years have passed and our operations are running smoothly under the Hoffman umbrella. We’re profitable and we need to re-invest in our own company. Otherwise, certain tax advantages will be lost. And then there’s you. You’ve returned and from my conversation with your uncle, I gathered you’ve done an outstanding job interfacing with your community.”
“Interfacing?”
Sandiford laughed. “Now that’s a word that’s just full of it, isn’t it? I mean people think highly of you, Barry. You provide a good service. Clayton and Clayton is in good hands and I’d like to know if you’re interested in joining hands with us. We have a lot to offer each other.”
“Maybe, but I need more information.”
“Of course. So do I. There is one consideration about the timing.”
“What?”
“Our fiscal year ends December 31st. If we can fast-track this thing, it helps our bottom line, and some of that help can be passed on to you.”
“You mean the sooner the deal, the better the deal?”
“Exactly.”
I looked at the calendar hanging above my computer screen. Today was the 9th. Ted Sandiford was talking three weeks with Christmas thrown in the middle. “That’s awfully fast, Ted. I don’t see how we can get everything worked out.”
“We don’t need everything worked out. If we have some key documents completed and notarized by year end, our team of accountants and lawyers can massage the details.”
I didn’t have a team other than my archery buddy Josh Birnam who did our taxes and Carl Romeo who had drafted my parents’ wills. I was David with an abacus going into negotiations against a massaging, interfacing Goliath who had invented his own syndrome. Ted Sandiford heard the silence.
“Barry, I want you to think what’s best for you and your father. You’ll come out with cash and a job. We offer corporate health care, a 401-k profit-sharing plan, administrative support, and you don’t even have to change your commute.”
“What about my parents?”
“You can use the money to get them into a proper home or a facility that handles special needs. I know this has hit you out of the blue. Like I said, I’m a bird dog. The corporate tax lawyers let me off my leash and I’m looking for the best game I can find. I hope we can at least go to the next level.”
“What’s that?”
“Meet face to face. Bring you down to the Atlanta office. You can get some numbers together for me and I can give you more specifics and start to hammer out a potential deal. What do you say? Is Thursday or Friday better for you?”
The dates on my calendar were as empty as a roadside wine bottle. “You know this business,” I said. “Hard to say. Right now I could probably swing Friday.”
“Great. I’ll keep both days open in case you need to adjust your schedule. Now here are some things you should pull together.”
Sandiford spent the next fifteen minutes listing the information I was to bring. In essence, he wanted our company books with the expense and revenue figures for the last three years. He also wanted purchase details of all our funeral supplies, furniture, embalming equipment including serial numbers, and company vehicles. His team would do a depreciation analysis which would affect the categories of the financial package Hoffman might offer. I hung up the phone with a head and legal pad swirling in numbers.
My first concern was explaining to Mom why I would be going to Atlanta. I didn’t want to lie but I didn’t want her to worry about a deal that might go nowhere. I decided to call Uncle Wayne. To my shock, he picked up the phone after two rings.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“Fine. Why shouldn’t I be?”
“You’re right by the phone.”
He laughed. “Getting ready to telephone you. See if you need any help. People always die when it’s least convenient.”
“Nobody’s died, but we did have a problem.” I told him about Dad’s pursuit of a haircut.
“Well, no two ways about it,” stated my uncle, “we got to figure a way to keep your dad from wandering off. Come springtime some tourist will run over him.”
“There might be an answer before then,” I said. “I just talked to Ted Sandiford in Atlanta. I think Hoffman is going to make an offer for the funeral home.”
My uncle said nothing for a few seconds. All I heard was shallow breathing.
“Uncle Wayne?”
“Could be the best thing, Barry. It’s up to you and your mother.”
“I want your say in it too, Uncle Wayne. And they want us to stay on.”
“An old coot like me?”
“Come on. You know more than any of us. And you have to admit most of our business is old coots.”
That got a chuckle out of him. “You told your mother yet?”
“No, and that’s a problem. They want me in Atlanta Friday to talk about a deal. What do you think? Should we have a family meeting?”
“Yes, when we’ve got something specific to discuss. But give your mom credit, Barry. She lives every day with the uncertainty of your father’s condition. She can live with the uncertainty of a business deal. Tell her you got a call and you’re going to at least listen to what they have to say. You’re the one with the future stake in all this. We’re here to support you.”
I thanked him and hung up. His advice made sense. Lunch would be the time to bring it up. Family decisions were always best discussed around the kitchen table.
I spent the rest of the morning compiling the figures for Ted Sandiford. Most of the information would be required for our business tax return anyway. Over tomato soup and turkey sandwiches, I told Mom about my Friday trip. She seemed more concerned about road conditions than the actual meeting. I suspected she didn’t want to discuss the implications of a sale as far as what she and Dad would do. Like Uncle Wayne, she kept deferring to whatever I thought best for me. I wanted to say what’s best for me is to know what’s best for you, but I held my tongue. Uncle Wayne was right. We needed more information.
At three o’clock, I was cross-referencing purchase records for embalming fluid and reconstructive cosmetics when a loud rap shook the office door.
“Wake you up?” asked Tommy Lee. He came in and eased into the red leather chair beside my desk.
“Why? Is this normally nap time in your department?”
“Not today. We had to work. Too many crazies out in the snow.” As he spoke the last words, his rough face reddened as he remembered Dad’s escapade.
“Present company included?”
“You know I didn’t mean that. One of the reasons I dropped by was to see how he’s doing.”
“He’s fine, but it looks like Mom and I have to become jailers. Any tips?”
Tommy Lee shifted in the chair, catching his holstered gun on the armrest. “You might consider installing inside electric locks. They work with a magnetic plate and a keypad. Punch in the code and the door opens. Then you’re not worrying about using a regular key to lock and unlock the doors.”
“Beats P.J.’s suggestion of an invisible fence,” I said.
“You could put a fenced area in the backyard. Give your dad a little roaming room without being able to wander off.”
The idea had merit, but not if we were moving. Although I wanted to talk to Tommy Lee about selling the business, I decided to wait till after my Atlanta trip.
Tommy Lee unbuttoned the chest pocket of his uniform jacket and withdrew a postcard-sized piece of cardboard and handed it to me. A color photo of a young blonde girl was on one side and descriptive information and phone numbers were on the other. The girl’s name was Tammy Patterson. Her picture looked like it had been taken for a high school yearbook.
“This girl’s gone missing,” said Tommy Lee. “Two weeks now. Everybody but the parents is convinced she ran away to Atlanta with her twenty-five-year-old boyfriend. Her father had these printed up and distributed to law enforcement offices in five counties.”
I knew where Tommy Lee was headed. “If Dad wanders off, you and your deputies could have them all ready.”
“Right. All of my deputies know your dad by sight, but the cards are also good for showing other people. I could keep them in the patrol cars. Take this one. The company’s name is on the back.” He shifted again, edging forward in the seat.
“You want to move into the front room? That chair’s pretty uncomfortable.”
“No, I’d rather talk here,” he said, and glanced at the door.
I realized he had closed it behind him.
“There’s something else,” he said, dropping his voice. “I have a friend in Sheriff Ewbanks’ department. I asked him a few questions, unofficially. He’s taking a chance for me so none of this can get back to Ewbanks.”
“I understand.”
“Seems like Hard-ass Hor-ass was livid last night that someone leaked Sammy Calhoun’s name to the TV station. I figured you told Susan and I know her aunt works at
NEWSCHANNEL-8
.”
“I told her not to tell,” I said. I wished I felt more confident she had listened to me.
“Sure,” said Tommy Lee. “The information could have come from any number of sources. Ewbanks is also pissed at the D.A. for making this case a showpiece. That just ratchets up the pressure and the media coverage. Suspects get dragged into the spotlight before a case has been built. I’m sure the same thing happened in Charlotte.”
Tommy Lee was right. Although I had only been a patrolman, I had heard the detectives complain about how too much pressure on high-profile cases created leaks that undercut their investigations.
“They’ve got something already?”
“They found the slug in the dirt. Must have stayed in the skull and fallen out when the backhoe uncovered it. Ballistics report came this afternoon. The Colt twenty-five fired the fatal shot.”
“They pull a number from the gun?”
“Yeah, and believe it or not prints were on the clip, but nothing’s been matched yet. They got lucky with the serial number too. The gun’s owner registered it. My contact says Ewbanks plans to drop by his house unannounced this evening. After the newscast and after most of the reporters have gone home. He doesn’t want any press tailing him.”
“You know who owns the gun?”
Tommy Lee nodded. “Walter Miller. Susan’s father.”
When it rains, it pours. Or in this case, when it snows, it dumps. Tommy Lee had no sooner stunned me with his revelation about Susan’s father than Mom knocked on the office door.
“I hate to interrupt,” she said. “The McBee family or at least a goodly portion of them are in the front room.”
“Who?”
“Claude McBee. He died this morning at the Springhaven nursing home and four grandchildren have come in a four-wheel-drive pickup to make funeral arrangements.”
“I think we’re done here,” said Tommy Lee. He stood up and Mom backed into the hall.
“Tell them I’ll be there in a moment,” I said. “I’ll see Tommy Lee out.” I walked him to the back porch where we could talk a minute before I met with the family.
“If you need me later, I should be at my desk,” said Tommy Lee. “Afraid I don’t have any advice other than to play it straight with Ewbanks.”
“I’m not going to bring up the picture unless he directly asks me about it.”
“And he might not ever ask. Ewbanks now has a connection stronger than whether you recognized a photograph.”
“I appreciate the advance warning.”
“I trust you to use it appropriately.” He zipped up his jacket and stepped onto the unshoveled walk. “And here’s another tip. If Stony McBee is here, don’t let him leave without frisking him. That man’s got magnetic fingers.”
I watched him trudge to his patrol car in the driveway. He and someone in Ewbanks’ department had gone out on a limb for me. I’d be very careful not to saw it off.
“I called Wayne,” Mom said behind me. “He’s coming in.”
“I wish he wouldn’t do that. Freddy should be available.” Freddy Mott worked as our on-call assistant, and I’d rather have him on the roads than my elderly uncle.
“He’s taken care of calling Freddy. Wayne says he knows the McBees won’t do anything before Saturday and he wants you to keep your Atlanta appointment.”
“All right,” I agreed, but I resented Uncle Wayne preempting my decisions. In some ways, I would never outgrow being little Barry, the favorite nephew. “I’ll make the arrangements with the McBees and then I’m going to snow-blow everything. It’s my responsibility to see Clayton and Clayton is open for business.”
I met for about half an hour with Claude McBee’s four grandchildren. They were representing Claude’s son and daughter, who were still at the nursing home. They wanted “to get in line,” as a granddaughter phrased it, in case somebody else died. I gave them basic information to take to their parents while watching the lanky young man named Stony. Although it may have been my imagination, he seemed to be casing the room. We set an appointment for a more detailed consultation, and I made it a priority to shake Stony’s hand and eye his pockets for suspicious bulges.
After they left, I cleared the snow from the walks and driveway. The mindless chore let my thoughts ramble. I kept thinking about the pistol in the grave. I was surprised that Walt Miller even owned a gun. Maybe he bought it as a paperweight. Walt made his living with a calculator and tax forms, and if Central Casting were asked to supply a CPA for a movie scene, Walt Miller would be the guy. The idea that he could outgun a private eye and then bury him on top of someone else was so preposterous as to be laughable. Except I couldn’t laugh away the picture of Susan in the murdered man’s wallet.
Between the top and bottom of the handicap ramp, I made the connection how I could get information from Walt without compromising Tommy Lee’s informant. Ted Sandiford’s phone call gave me my cover.
The winter sun raced toward the Appalachian ridges as my jeep moved slowly but steadily along Highway 25. It wasn’t quite four-thirty, and I became concerned I hadn’t allowed enough time to travel from Gainesboro to Walt Miller’s cottage north of Asheville.
Susan’s father was a sixty-five-year-old widower who had found himself surrounded by too many memories. Three years ago, he had sold the house where he and his wife had lived and moved to a two-bedroom stone cottage purchased from a client’s estate. Although he maintained an office in Asheville, thanks to email and the Internet, most of his accounting practice was being handled from his house. I expected to find him there, but I wanted to catch him alone. As dusk deepened, the prospect grew that Sheriff Ewbanks might arrive at Walt Miller’s sooner than I would.
I turned onto his drive and relaxed. The snow was unblemished.
“Barry? What are you doing out in this weather?” He met me at his front door with a quizzical expression that immediately changed to panic. “Susan? Is Susan okay?”
“Yes, Walt. She’s fine. Sorry to drop in unannounced. I was driving around doing some thinking and I realized you were nearby. I stopped in on the chance you’d have a few minutes to talk business.”
His relief that nothing had happened to his daughter overrode any question as to why I’d be twenty miles from home in the snow.
“Sure. Come on in. Is this a den discussion?”
“You might want to make some notes.”
He led me back to the second bedroom, which served as his office. Through the rear window I could see snow covering the border of grass between the house and bare hardwoods. The long twilight shadows of tree trunks and twisted limbs spread across the white canvas, soon to be lost in the evening darkness.
Walt crossed the room to his oak desk where stacks of client files became a barricade between us. Susan had told me that for as long as she could remember, Christmas had been celebrated with tinsel, trees, and IRS forms, just as Easter had meant colored eggs, chocolate, and April 15th tax returns. Walt stood braced against the back of his desk chair, looking at me curiously. The collar of his red flannel shirt bunched around his neck, and errant strands of thinning gray hair radiated from his head.
“So what’s on your mind?”
“I’m thinking of selling the funeral home.” I eased into the chair opposite him.
Walt pondered my statement and nodded. Then he rolled his swivel chair to the end of the desk where he could look around the mountain range of papers. “You going back to Charlotte?”
“I don’t know. Probably not right away.”
“Have you told Susan?”
“No. I haven’t told anyone. The preliminary meeting with the buyer is Friday in Atlanta. I want to keep it confidential. The whole thing may fall apart.”
“Happens more often than not,” he said. “What can I do?”
“Josh Birnam’s been our accountant for years so I’ll bring him into it, but I’d like to get a second opinion, a paid opinion on the best way to structure things. You may have more life experience.”
The chair squeaked as Walt leaned back and laughed. “That’s probably the most diplomatic way I’ve ever been called an old geezer. Sure. Glad to help. But this consultation’s on the house. Josh is a good CPA. I may have some suggestions to protect your parents’ estate. I assume they’ll be moving.”
“Mom will at some point. Dad’s going to need supervised care soon. He took an arctic expedition on his own this morning.”
“Is he all right?”
“Yes. Luckily I was there to look for him.” I tried not to let the tension come through my voice as I cast my bait. “Guess that was one good thing about the body at Eagle Creek cemetery.”
“What body?” Walt brought the chair forward and leaned across the desk corner.
“You didn’t see the news last night?”
“I don’t stay up past ten and today’s newspaper is somewhere under the snow.”
“We were doing a routine grave transfer yesterday and found a skeleton buried on top of the vault. By the time I got through with the sheriff and crime lab, the weather was so bad I stayed at the funeral home.”
“They know who it was?”
“
NEWSCHANNEL-8
said the body has been identified as Samuel Calhoun.”
Walt Miller didn’t speak. His face turned as gray as the twilight snow. I just sat there.
“You found Sammy Calhoun?” he whispered.
“I found a skeleton. All I know is what I heard on TV.”
Clearly, the news startled him. I tried to analyze deeper reactions; he seemed reluctant to say more.
“So, you knew him?” I pressed.
Walt looked at the papers on his desk. “Not really. Someone Susan met in New York.”
“New York?”
“When she was in med school.”
The ground suddenly shifted under me. Susan had told me she met Sammy Calhoun through her Aunt Cassie. That she couldn’t help who might carry a picture of her. I thought about the photograph. The street and buildings in the background could be New York. No skyscrapers but the eclectic storefronts of lower Manhattan. Susan had asked me if she were alone in the picture. Was that to make sure there wasn’t evidence tying her to Sammy Calhoun? I sorted through the jumble of contradictions with the mind of an ex-policeman and the heart of a lover.
“He was bad news,” said Walt. “I thought he moved away.”
“He followed her to Asheville?” I asked.
Before he could answer, a solid knock sounded from the front door.
“Who could that be?” asked Walt.
I followed him, knowing Horace Ewbanks had arrived.
The sheriff stood straight as a new fence post. The only thing different in his attire from when I’d last seen him was a toothpick dangling on his lip instead of a Pall Mall. He planned on coming inside.
Behind him, a deputy slouched against a stone column of Walt’s porch, his easy grin in contrast to the sheriff’s scowl.
“Mr. Walter Miller?” asked Ewbanks.
“Yes.”
“I’m Sheriff Horace Ewbanks from over in Walker County. This is my deputy John Bridges. We need to talk with you a few minutes.” He looked at me. “Evening, Mr. Clayton. Small world ain’t it?”
“Mr. Clayton’s here for an appointment,” said Walt. “Is something wrong? Has there been an accident?”
“No. Just a few questions. Where can we talk in private?”
Walt looked back at me as if I somehow had a say in the matter.
“It’s all right. I’ll wait.”
“Okay,” said Walt. “I have an office, Sheriff.”
“That’ll do. Bridges, keep Mr. Clayton company. Have a little chat. I don’t think we’ll cut into his appointment too long.”
“Y’all can use the den,” said Walt.
The fact that Ewbanks gave me a keeper rather than follow a two-on-one interview procedure made me nervous. He wasn’t pleased to discover the man who found Calhoun’s skeleton in the home of the owner of the murder weapon.
Deputy Bridges trailed me into a pine-paneled room with a stone fireplace at one end. An oval, brown and tan braided rug covered the hardwood floor between a cracked leather sofa and the high hearth.
“Have a seat,” I said. “I’ll tend the fire.” I dropped the kindling on the glowing coals and heard the crackle as new flames greedily devoured the dry oak strips. For a few seconds, the acrid smoke leaked from the fireplace until the air warmed enough to carry it aloft through the chimney. I added split logs, and then I sat down on the hard hearth. The long shadows of the andirons danced like animated bones on the floor between us.
“That was quite a surprise yesterday,” said Bridges. He angled his body in the corner of the sofa and propped one leg across a cushion, careful to keep his damp boot clear. He looked about forty. Close-cropped black hair. A moustache starting to turn gray at the edges. Everything about him was easygoing except his eyes. “Who would have thought to hide a body in a graveyard?”
“You didn’t take my call yesterday, did you?”
“No. That was Clint Carson. I hear he hung up on you. Failed to see the humor in the situation.”
“So did I.”
“It’s no laughing matter, that’s for sure.”
Bridges closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Sheriff was lucky you were the undertaker.”
“How’s that?”
The deputy ignored the question, content to enjoy the warmth of the fire. After a few minutes, I thought he might be squeezing in a quick nap. Then he opened his eyes and looked at me as if he’d been watching me through his closed lids all along. “Tommy Lee Wadkins says you’re a good man. I heard all about that Willard business last year.”
Dallas Willard had killed his brother and sister at the funeral of his grandmother. He’d turned the shotgun on me but didn’t go three for three. I had a nice scar on my shoulder as a souvenir of the adventure and a closer friendship with Tommy Lee because of the collaborative success we had in bringing a killer to justice.
“You’ve worked with Tommy Lee?”
“Used to be his deputy. My wife died about ten years ago and Tommy Lee arranged a job with Ewbanks so my thirteen-year-old daughter and I could move to Walker County and be closer to my parents. Raising a teenager and working the crazy hours of law enforcement was a recipe for disaster. I knew I needed help.”
“Glad it worked out.”
“For a time. A girl without a mother was a handful. Since she turned eighteen, we’ve hardly spoken.”
I didn’t know what to say, and so I just nodded and stared at the fire.
“But Tommy Lee was there for me when I needed him. He knows he can count on me.” He let the statement hang out in the air.
I got the message. John Bridges was Tommy Lee’s conduit of information.
“I mentioned the skeleton to Walt Miller,” I said. “He hadn’t heard anything about it.”