TheCart Before the Corpse (21 page)

As they strolled away from the station, Amos said, “Okay, tell me about Jacob Yoder.” He nodded to the lady with the Lucille Ball hair. Geoff didn’t remember her name, but he winced when he thought of all those mimosas.

“Rap sheet’s not as long as your entire arm, but I’d bet it would stretch above your elbow,” Geoff said. He managed a smile, although he wanted to avoid eye contact with the woman. Was that a smile or a sardonic grin she gave him? He collected his thoughts and said, “Jacob started with minor vandalism up around Intercourse where he’s from.”

“Amish. I guessed as much.”

“Got caught at sixteen painting naked ladies on barns under the hex signs. An Amish version of tagging. His kin would probably have taken care of that one with a buggy whip, except that he made the mistake of picking on some non-Amish barns, got caught, and the police were brought in.”

“Actually, that’s kind of funny,” Amos said.

“Juvenile authorities must have thought so too. He was put on diversion and given to his parents. He had to paint over all his naked ladies.”

“Great loss to the world of art.” Amos waved at Ingrid Beechum at her bakery. Bob the Chihuahua barked at him.

“Damn dog thinks he’s a real dog,” Amos said. “Even after he got picked up by the hawk. He just
never
got the memo about being more rodent than guard dog.”

Geoff cut his eyes at Amos. He knew Amos wanted him to ask about Bob and the hawk, so he didn’t. Since college Amos had found ways to drop bombs into the conversation while he fought the urge to act interested or ask questions. He’d driven Amos nuts that way since college. He wasn’t about to let his guard down now. “So. Next Yoder steals a car and wrecks it. His family paid, so he was given probation.”

“Tough on a teen-aged boy to be a motor head when your family’s mode of transportation is a horse drawn carriage,” Amos said. He nodded toward the bakery. “Incidentally, that woman makes the best cream cake in six counties.”

“Uh-huh. The next car he stole belonged to a young man who was boarding with the Yoders to learn everything about carriages. Guess what his name was?”

“Wouldn’t be Lackland, now would it?” Amos asked. He walked across the street, sat on a bench and stretched his legs out.

Geoff sat beside him. “Indeed it was Lackland. Only this time he wrecked the car and killed the teenaged town girl he’d persuaded to go partying with him. Her father was a lawyer. Yoder got two years for vehicular homicide.”

“What happened when he came out? I’ve heard those folks shun family members who get above their raisin’.”

“I don’t know who ditched whom, but he disappeared,” Geoff said.

Nearly everybody that walked by nodded and smiled at Amos. He nodded and smiled back, but didn’t invite anyone into their conversation and nobody came over. That, Geoff assumed, was because he, the outsider, was sitting beside Amos.

“Was Lackland still living with the Yoders when Yoder went to jail?” Amos asked.

“Don’t know. I’m having one of my people in Atlanta see if he can get me work history on Lackland. I suspect, however, judging by Merry Abbott’s age, Hiram was gone and married before Yoder got out of prison. He served the whole two years, by the way. Let us say he did not adjust well to prison life.”

“He must have turned into a real bad ass.”

“Not quite enough to get his sentence extended, but enough to keep him from parole. After that he seems to have kept his nose clean for a few years.”

“Wife? Children?”

“Not on record. Even if he’d wanted to come home, I doubt his community was into killing the fatted calf for the returning prodigal.”

“So at this point he’s what, thirty?”

“About,” Geoff said. “That’s when he committed a couple of robberies with violence. Held up some liquor stores. Got caught.”

“Pennsylvania?” Amos asked.

“Nope. Georgia. Did a dime out of twenty. After that a bunch of Joe jobs. I talked to a couple of his ex-employers. The ones that remember him say that he was a hard worker when he was sober. Painter, roofer, construction, drywall, the kind of guy who can fix anything including cars and trucks.”

“And when he was drunk?” Amos asked. He stood and walked away without checking to see that Geoff was following.

Geoff caught up with him. “Bar room brawls, drunk and disorderlies, and domestics. The last time he sent his current girlfriend and her new girlfriend to the hospital for serious surgeries. That turned into grievous bodily harm and three years.”

“Did he hunt up Lackland or did Lackland seek him out?”

“Yoder says that he saw a write-up about Lackland moving down to Mossy Creek in a local paper a year and a half ago. Started corresponding. Lackland needed somebody to help him build the place. Whether he brought pressure to bear or not, Lackland went before the parole board and offered him a job. When he got out, he came down here to finish his sentence, where, to hear him tell it, he and Lackland worked like navvies. Says Lackland promised him a working partnership. Seems really pissed that Lackland got himself murdered.”

“So, what if Lackland reneged on the offer once Merry Abbott agreed to visit him?”

“Wouldn’t be the first time Yoder reacted with violence. Lackland says
no
to the partnership, Yoder picks up that broken shaft and hits him, then either believes he’s dead or decides that he’s got a better chance of keeping out of jail again if he finishes the job and sets it up to look like an accident.”

“What about his alibi?” Amos asked.

“I’ve got a call into the M.E. in Bigelow to see how much fudge factor there is in Lackland’s time of death. As cold as it was Friday night, and with the storm, it’s possible Lackland died earlier than originally thought. We don’t know what time he had his last meal since he brought sandwiches with him, so we can’t judge by that. The last time anyone admits to seeing him is mid-afternoon Friday. If he was killed earlier than Saturday morning, Yoder might have killed him before he drove down the mountain to meet Sallie Sue.”

“How?” Amos asked.

“Beg your pardon?”

“Yoder parks his old truck over in the trees by his trailer. So how does he get down the mountain without driving through the pasture and down Hiram’s gravel road?”

“Good question. How about we drive out there and find out.”

The men walked around to the parking area behind the police station, picked up Amos’s squad car and headed out the road to Lackland’s farm. “What’s all that about Lackland owing him?” Amos asked as he swung out onto the street.

“Wouldn’t say, but I’m thinking maybe Yoder didn’t actually steal that car in which the girl was killed. Maybe Lackland was driving.”

“Why would Yoder take the blame?”

“Money? Promise of wealth to come? I do not know, but the man is slimy as an eel and capable of killing Lackland in a fit of anger.”

“Trigger?” Amos asked.

“Again, I don’t know. Yoder would blackmail St. Peter. I’m sure he knows more than he’s telling, but he’s not going say a word unless he figures he can’t make a buck out of it.”

“Then I hope he knows what he’s doing,” Amos said.

Chapter 24

Thursday afternoon

Geoff

Peggy Caldwell’s truck was parked in front of the barn beside Hiram’s white dually and trailer. When they walked around to the stable, the two men saw Merry Abbott and Peggy Caldwell harnessing the big black horse to a two-wheeled wooden cart. Yoder leaned against the open stable door watching, but making no attempt to help. The miniature donkey leaned shoulder to knee against the big black horse like a four-legged gray wart.

“There,” Merry said as she buckled the padded girth around the horse’s big middle. He seemed to have gone to sleep. His head drooped, and his eyes were half closed. The donkey’s ears twitched but not much else.

Geoff had never seen a horse and carriage close up, and had only a vague idea of how a harness worked. The instant Yoder saw the two men he pushed away from the door of the barn and drifted inside.

Geoff let him go. At least he hadn’t absconded yet.

“Come back, Jacob,” Merry called after him. “You’re going to help drive. We’ve got to get Heinzie and Peggy ready for Easter Sunday.”

“You taking the jackass along?” Yoder asked.

Merry patted the cross on the donkey’s back. “More appropriate for Palm Sunday. I can’t believe he’s actually that big a problem.”

Yoder snickered. “Hiram tried to wean him off ever since they got here. Heinzie got better. The jackass did not.”

Geoff wondered what they were talking about. Both horse and donkey seemed to be dozing.

“Still got one axle to pack on the vis-à-vis,” Jacob said. “Need to move her outside where we can scrub her down too. Needs a paint job.”

“That will have to wait a bit, but we can pack the axle, wash the carriage and practice drive it tomorrow afternoon after the funeral,” Merry said. “With Don Qui locked in his stall. In the meantime, give us a hand putting Heinzie to the Meadowbrook.”

Geoff figured he and Amos were being ignored on purpose. The Meadowbrook, a medium-sized two wheeled cart with a black leather-covered bench split into two seats, sat behind the horse with its shafts resting on a wooden sawhorse.

He watched the complicated procedure of putting the horse into the harness and the carriage to the horse. Then Peggy climbed in from the rear and took up the reins.

A long buggy whip stood upright in a shiny brass holder at the right hand side of the front of the carriage, but Peggy didn’t touch it. “Heinzie, walk on.” Peggy’s voice sounded shaky, but Heinzie obligingly ambled off. The cart bounced slightly every time it rolled over a stone or a minor bump.

Don Qui nearly fell over when his leaning post walked away from him, but came instantly awake and marched beside Heinzie’s left front leg.

“I’ve seen Dalmatians trot under carriages,” Merry said, “But this is ridiculous.”

Geoff thought the wooden cart looked light and fragile, as though it might take flight at anything faster than a walk.

Peggy walked Heinzie into the dressage arena. Don Qui kept pace.

Merry walked to the center of the arena where she could call to Peggy as she drove.

Heinzie was as large as the teams of Clydesdales and Percherons he’d watched in parades. Long feathers of hair trailed down over his hooves, which were as wide as soup tureens. His black mane flowed below his shoulder and eddied in the late afternoon breeze. He seemed content simply to walk around the arena, and Don Qui seemed content to walk beside him.

If the horse ever decided to take off at a gallop, however, he’d be unstoppable and the donkey would be left far behind.

“Move him up into a trot,” Merry said.

Peggy glanced over at her. Geoff saw her jaw set. “Tur-rot on,” she said.

Heinzie walked.

“Trot on, blast it.”

Heinzie walked.

Peggy frowned, Yoder, leered, Merry laughed.

“Pick up your whip and tap him on his flank when you say trot,” Merry said. “Tap, don’t whack.”

“Oh, dear,” Peggy whispered, but she did as she was told. “Trot
on.”

Heinzie opened his eyes wide at the touch of the whip against his shoulder, snorted once, and trotted. He ate up the space around the arena with his long stride.

“
Yeah
, baby. Go,” Peggy said.

Don Qui managed to keep up with the big horse, although his short legs worked like sewing machine needles.

“Easy,” Merry said.

Heinzie apparently heard her because he dropped into a slower trot. He lowered his head, arched his neck, and swung his broad hindquarters from side to side as though he were dancing a samba.

“Shoot, that looks like fun,” Amos said.

A couple of more figure eights and Peggy pulled Heinzie down to a walk as she came abreast of the two men. “Jacob, I can handle this. Amos, climb aboard.”

“O-kay.”

Yoder climbed out and held the seat up so Amos could get in and sit.

“Trot on,” Peggy said. This time Heinzie trotted at the sound of Peggy’s voice. Merry came to stand beside Geoff with her hands in the pockets of her jeans and a broad grin on her face. “You’re next.”

“I’m not dressed for it,” Geoff said.

“Sure you are. If you drive in a show you’ll have to wear a top hat or a bowler.” She stared him up and down. “You look like a top hat guy. Today, however, you get to be safe.” She handed him a black helmet with a chinstrap. “It’s a hard hat to protect your thick skull.”

He glanced down at Merry as she watched the horse and carriage trot lazy figure eights around the arena and caught his breath. He didn’t think he’d ever seen such naked longing. No more like lust. She ached to be out there holding those reins instead of Peggy.

So why wasn’t she?

When he changed places with Amos, he found the sight of Heinzie’s oversized butt sashaying from side to side as his mega-hooves clopped felt almost hypnotic. Maybe after all this was over, nah. Atlanta was too far away to drive up here for lessons, and he didn’t think he’d enjoy them unless Merry was teaching them.

“Heinzie, strong trot,” Peggy said. The big black horse moved to a much faster gear instantly.

Geoff grabbed the wooden fender over the wheel.

Crack!

Without warning, the Meadowbrook gave a sickening lurch to the left, collapsed underneath him and threw his body against the wheel. His left shoulder connected with the metal rim. He felt as though somebody had whacked him with a crowbar.

The rim of his hard hat connected with the edge of the wooden fender with a jolt that rattled his teeth and crossed his eyes.

Peggy screamed, fell against him, and crushed him against the wheel with all her weight.

Ahead of him Heinzie reared, bucked and struggled to stay on his feet while the carriage, now canted over on its left side, dragged through the sand at a forty-five degree angle.

“Whoa!” Merry raced past the cart, grabbed Heinzie’s reins and shouted, “Heinzie, stand!”

More running feet, and a moment later, Peggy’s weight shifted off him as Amos dragged her back toward the right side of the cart. “Geoff, crawl out,” Amos shouted.