Over Troubled Water: A Hunter Jones Mystery (19 page)

“Later on,” he said, “you’re going to wish for some lazy days like this, all alone at home with nothing to do, and your husband bringing you lunch.”

“You’re probably right,” she said. “But I hate just sitting around doing nothing.”

As soon as he left, she went back to her computer and wrote down everything she could remember from her conversation with Robin.

Sam settled down in a plastic covered chair in Ricky Richards room in the Physical Therapy Unit of the Magnolia County Medical Center.

“I’ve got to get out of here,” Ricky said. “This is costing a small fortune, and I could do all this stuff myself at home.”

His right leg was in a complicated metal brace.

“You’ve got those bars to hold onto while you walk?” Sam asked.

“No, but we could rig up something,” Ricky said impatiently. “Tell me what you’ve found out about the gym.”

“The Fire Marshall’s sure it was arson,” Sam said. “The fire started right in the middle, probably with every towel you had there, and a can of gasoline. He said it could have been started as early as one or two a.m. By the time it was called in there wasn’t much they could do except contain it.”

“I saw the pictures from the paper,” Ricky said. “All I can say is I’m glad at least we had it insured. Jaybird Hilliard came by yesterday and said that he could rent me one of the spaces in that plaza thing of his, but it looks like we’re going to have to sell the house and move in with my folks for a while. I’ve gotten over wailing, and I’m trying to keep my chin up and think things through practically, but Sasha is just crushed.”

“It’s been pretty awful for her,” Sam said.

“I know,” Ricky said. “But it’s like I told her. Whoever killed the others meant to kill me too, but he didn’t, and I’m not going to lie down and die on my own. I’m used to working hard and trying to get somewhere, and I’m going to get us back where we were.”

“Good attitude,” Sam said. “Now I need to find out why somebody might want to kill you. Have you got any ideas?”

“You’re serious, aren’t you?” Ricky asked.

“I sure am,” Sam said, “and this is just me and you talking. Somebody tried to kill you, and then somebody burned your gym down. I know from Jack Bremmer that you’re going to get a pretty good insurance payout on the gym, but not enough to replace the whole thing, so I know you didn’t have it done yourself. I’m figuring the arsonist was somebody who wanted to do you harm, and we’ve got reason to think that the same person started the fire who did the shooting.”

He brought out copies of the two Abomination letters and gave them to Ricky to read after explaining their timing.

“This is crazy stuff,” Ricky said after reading both letters. “It sounds like some lunatic who just wanted to kill people and brag about it afterward.”

“And that’s one possibility, and we’re working on that,” Sam said. “The other possibility is that it was somebody who had a specific target in mind at Foxtail Creek and just did the rest to make it look like a lunatic—or maybe set your gym on fire because he didn’t succeed in killing you on the bridge.”

“So you think it’s somebody who hates me,” Ricky said.

“That’s one way I’ve got to look at it,” Sam said.

The door opened and a bright-eyed young woman in an aqua jumpsuit bounced in.

“Mr. Richards, it’s time to get to work again,” she said.

“Sorry,” Sam said, “I’m the Sheriff of Magnolia County and I’m investigating a multiple homicide. He’s not going to be available for a while.”

She looked startled and backed out.

“I really need to get out of here,” Ricky said, “I feel like it’s costing me money if anybody even walks through that door.”

“I’m not here to talk about that,” Sam said. “So, don’t change the subject. I need to know who might really have it in for you, Ricky. I’ve got three unsolved homicides, and the ones that did get killed can’t tell me anything. I need to know anything that will help get this guy behind bars.”

Ricky Richards stared out the window for a little while before he started talking.

“There are a few guys who might think that I might have fooled around with their wives or girlfriends,” he said, “But that was before I married Sasha, which is like three years now. There’s one who doesn’t speak to me, and I mean he turns around and walks off it I come into a room. There’s one I’m pretty sure kept me from being asked to join the Rotary Club, and there’s one who lives in Atlanta now, but his wife still lives here. They got divorced, but wasn’t really about me, and she’s remarried. There’s another who thinks he’s got something to be mad at me about, but he doesn’t, because nothing happened. I settled down when I met Sasha, but there’s her ex-husband. He lives over in Taylor County.”

“This is a good start,” Sam said. “Now, how about names?”

CHAPTER 16

A storm hit Magnolia County on Thursday night. It did no real damage, but left the creeks running a little higher and the ground soggier.

Aaron Twitchell drove over Foxtail Creek Bridge at about eight a.m. on Friday morning wishing somebody would come and clear away the flowers and wreaths. The ones people had brought from their gardens had long since wilted, and the plastic ones were now scattered across the bridge.

He knew he could clean it up himself and toss everything in the back of the truck, but the memories made his head hurt. He had driven into town the long way several times just to avoid the bridge. Now he swerved to avoid a tangled wreath and drove uphill until he came to the dirt road on the left that had no sign. It was known locally as Old Dairy Road.

There was a downward slope on one side, where the creek had been cutting a gentle valley for countless years. On the other there was farmland.

Aaron came to a curve after about a half mile and saw what he was looking for – a small herd of goats on one side of the road and a battered trailer on the other. It had a neatly swept dirt yard shaded by a big umbrella-shaped chinaberry tree. The brick chimney of a house that had burned down years before was still standing. There was a handpainted sign on it that offered “Fresh Goat Milk.”

Aaron knew that in other seasons it would also offer “Fresh U-Pick Scupnons” but that very few people were willing to do the picking since the scuppernong arbor was half collapsed and full of weeds and vines. To most local people who knew the area near the creek, the sign might as well say “Fresh U-Pick Snakes.”

He pulled up in the yard and honked. Jeremiah Jones came out of his house, carrying a long stick.

“Hey, Mr. Jeremiah,” Aaron called out as the goats came running across the road and surrounded his truck. “It’s me, Aaron Twitchell. You got time to talk a while?”

“Nothin’ but time,” the old man replied, taping the porch floor with his stick and making his way to an old metal lawn chair.

He was thin as a rail and the darkest-skinned man of Aaron’s experience. His hair and beard were white and his eyes were pale blue, but not because they had started out that way. Aaron doubted Jeremiah Jones could see much at all. An old black and tan coonhound pushed his way through the goats and laid his muzzle on the old man’s knees.

“You got everything you need?” Aaron asked, pushing a black and white goat aside and taking the matching chair. “Got enough food in there?”

“More than I can eat,” Jeremiah said. “My daughter comes over three or four times a week with greens and cornbread, sometimes some soup. Best thing she brings is strawberry jam and peanut butter and light bread. You ever had one of them sandwiches?”

He scratched the dog behind the ears.

“Yessir,” Aaron said. “That’s a good sandwich.”

“I make one for ol’ BuddyRo here, too,” he said. “Every time my daughter comes back, she fusses cause she’s got to throw out half of what she brought before and I need more light bread. She wants me to come live with them, but she won’t have BuddyRo, and I’m not leavin’ him, nor the goats neither.”

He pushed another goat aside with his stick and said, “Tell me who you are again.”

“Aaron Twitchell,” Aaron said. “My daddy was Lewis Twitchell. I live on Sumter Road.”

The old man beamed.

“You come from good people,” he said, “Now if them goats are pesterin’ you too much, you can use my stick.”

“They’re not bothering me,” Aaron said, “You got many customers for the goat milk?”

“Just that one lady,” Jeremiah said. “Miz Chapman—the one that got shot on the bridge. When my daughter told me that it ’bout made me cry. That was a good lady. She even got the scupnons, when they was in season. Rode out here on a bicycle like she was a little girl, and she’d sit and talk, too. Last Christmas she brought me a Claxton fruitcake. She said she could make a better one herself, but she knew I liked the store-bought kind. What’s the world comin’ too that somebody like that gets shot?”

“It was a terrible thing,” Aaron said. “I saw it right after it happened. Can’t get it outta my mind.”

“If that’s what you came to talk about, I already spoke to the sheriff’s men who came around that mornin’,” Jeremiah said. “I wasn’t much help ’cept I heard the shots. I thought it was firecrackers – all that poppin’ – and BuddyRo was barkin’ his head off, but I didn’t see anything.”

“Well, what I wanted to ask you about was something else,” Aaron said. “I’m working for Sheriff Bailey, and I’m trying to figure out who knows how to get around this place out here. Who would know how to get down to the creek?”

Jeremiah was silent for a long time.

“Well, Tucker Parsons knows all that other side,” he finally said, “He doesn’t mind my goats ’cause he grows cotton, and they don’t bother cotton. Mostly they keep the weeds down around his barn. You know that used to be a cow barn. That’s how I wound up with the goats to start with. Old Mr. Haycock had a couple of customers who wanted goat milk. Later on, they sold all the cows but left the goats.”

“Yessir, I remember hearin’ that,” Aaron said. “Who do you think could find their way around on this side?”

“Most of the ones who knowed it are passed – like Timbo Weatherspoon used to do some trappin’ and old Wild Bill Carson had some land down the road – well he’s been gone for fifty years or more – and his boy Will, well he’s passed too, hasn’t he?”

“About six or seven years ago, I think,” Aaron said, pushing a goat aside and leaning closer. “Did the Carsons live out this way?”

“No, Sir,” the old man said and laughed. “It ain’t fit to live in when you get a little bit down the road from here. Too steep. Used to be bears and bobcats, too. The Carsons had a little land nobody wanted, or maybe they didn’t own it, and just used it. There was more cars on this road at night way back then than ever has been since. Wild Bill made good corn whiskey down there. Everybody knew it and nobody stopped him. Young Will worked with him, mostly ran up to the turnaround when somebody honked their horn, but then the old man died. Will just didn’t have the gift, I had some of his whiskey once, and it was like drinkin’ kerosene.”

“So that’s why he wound up in the cleaning business,” Aaron said, grinning. “Cause he couldn’t make good moonshine.”

“But he was still comin’ an’ goin’. I used to see that big truck of his almost every day,” Jeremiah said, frowning a bit. “I heard some govment people got him for pourin’ out his cleanin’ stuff in the creek. It killed a bunch of fish in the river. That’s what I heard anyway. All I know for sure is I stopped seein’ that truck.”

“You know who owns that land now?” Aaron asked.

“It woulda been hard to sell,” Jeremiah said. “It flooded five or six times, and it was way off the main road. Not fit for anything but makin’ moonshine and getting’ rid of garbage, far as I know. Some folks still dump stuff there.”

“Did you know Will Carson’s son?” Aaron asked, trying to keep his voice easy going. “He’s got the cleaning business now. His name is Russell.”

“I don’t remember the name,” Aaron said, “but Will used to have this boy get out of his truck sometimes to shoo the goats off the road. Skinny little boy in glasses. I think he was scareder of the goats than they were of him. He had a girl who came with him sometimes, too, but she was older than the boy.”

“Well, thank you for your time,” Aaron said.

“Ain’t got nuthin’ but time,” the old man said, and then, as Aaron stood up and started making his way though the goats, Jeremiah Jones had another question.

“What’d you say your name was?”

Aaron told him again and then drove on down the dirt road until he came to the turnaround, which was nothing but a bare patch of red clay and big enough to turn around in. He got out and looked down through the scrappy pine woods. There were old tires, broken chairs, a refrigerator on its side. The sun had come out and he could see the creek water glittering in the distance.

He turned and looked the other way. The farm fields had ended on that side, and there was nothing but more woods.

Sam was on the phone with T.J. Jackson.

“I need your help with something,” he said. “There’s somebody we need to interview over in Taylor County and I don’t want to go that far from home right now. Hunter could have the baby any time now.

“Why me?” T.J. asked.

“Just a better match, and this is sensitive,” Sam said. “This guy went to the University about the same time you did,” Sam said. “His name is Cameron Coley. Called Cam. Sells tractors, grows peaches. Old money, I think.”