An Unmarked Grave (12 page)

I made a mental note to drive by the scene so I could describe it to the family in case one of them asked.

The country around Elysian Hills is fairly open and
rolling-like many Texans brag, nothing but wide-open
spaces. And far to the west of those wide-open spaces, the
sun dropped below the horizon. With the coming night, the
temperature began to fall. The weatherman had forecast a
light freeze.

My stomach growled. I was ready for a hot meal and a
warm bed. I'd visit Buck Ford first thing in the morning.
"Where's the nearest motel around here?"

Pointing east, she replied, "Bunch of them on 1-35 at
Reuben. About ten miles. The Bucket Inn Motel is the cleanest"

Having grown up on a farm outside of Church Point, I was familiar with the eerie loneliness of vast spaces. Even
during daylight, the overwhelming sense of solitude seemed
ready to engulf you, and the gray of dusk settling over hundreds of square miles of desolate prairies exacerbated the
feeling.

So when I spotted the beckoning lights of the truck stops
and motels along 1-35, a grin came to my face.

After checking in, I enjoyed a thick steak downstairs at
the Bucket Inn restaurant.

Satisfied after a filling meal, I returned to my room to
update my note cards for the day. Tomorrow, I planned
to visit Buck Ford and Marvin Lewis.

I paused as I studied the cards I'd written concerning my
conversation with the sheriff. I still couldn't understand how
Sheriff Paley could run a criminal check on Justin and not
remember the guy's name.

There was a nip in the air next morning.

Just after eight, I headed for Elysian Hills. I had risen
early, enjoyed a breakfast of sausage, pancakes soaked with
butter and syrup, and coffee-what some Cajuns considered a heart-healthy breakfast.

Before I pulled out, on impulse I purchased a copy of The
Reuben Journal and scanned it for local news that meant
nothing to me.

The narrow macadam road between Elysian Hills and
1-35 meandered over the hills and through the valleys. To my
surprise, there was more traffic than I would have guessed:
pickups from the bedroom communities commuting to work;
cattle trucks hauling beef to market; and oil tankers carrying
freshly pumped oil to refineries.

America on the move.

The sun was at my back. I had to adjust the rearview mirror to keep it from blinding me.

I topped a hill, and my eyes popped open when I stared
into the menacing grill of a giant Peterbilt eighteen-wheeler
taking his half of the road right down the middle. I jerked
onto the shoulder, struggling to slow the pickup and maintain control of the vehicle.

I finally braked to a halt off the road and for several
moments sat staring in relief at the dash in front of me.
"Good thing you saw him, Tony," I muttered. I glanced in
the rearview, squinting into the sunlight, but the truck had
disappeared over the crest of the hill.

All I could figure was that the sun had blinded the driver.

Buck Ford pumped oil and fattened cattle. A railroad spur
ran up to his place, terminating inside a large metal barn.
On either side of the spur sprawled several feed pens for
beef. Half of them were filled with bawling cows. The smell
smacked me full in the face.

As I turned into the drive, I had to pull over for a loaded
cattle truck to pass. I couldn't help wondering if the truck
that had run me off the road was one of Ford's.

I stopped at the office, which was a separate building from
the white brick house. An older woman in western garb informed me that Buck was out at the barn.

Parking in front of the massive barn, I stepped out and
tugged my tweed jacket about me. The air was crisp, and my
breath frosted over. I whistled softly when I stepped through
the open doors. It was huge, wide-open, and cold. You could
fit a football field in it with room to spare. At one end of a raised platform, feed trucks were lined up, dumping their
loads into large hoppers along the bottom of which ran conveyer belts with partitioned chambers carrying feed from
the barn to the holding pens.

I spotted a small group of men in western hats and the
requisite western regalia standing around a dozen bales of
hay. Behind them, a propane burner poured warm air into
the barn. They looked around as I approached. I nodded.
"Morning. I'm looking for Buck Ford"

Three of the group looked at the fourth man.

"That's me," said the fourth one. Buck Ford was about
my height, five-ten, but he outweighed me by seventy-five
pounds, most of it in the watermelon belly pushing his heavy
coat aside and draping over his silver-dollar belt buckle. His
western shirt was stretched so tight over his stomach that
I couldn't figure out how the little pearl buttons remained
snapped.

I offered my hand and introduced myself. Briefly, I told
him the purpose of my visit. "Sheriff Perry told me you
found the wreck"

Ford ran the tip of his tongue behind his bottom lip, moving around his wad of snuff. "Yep. Coming back from one
of my pastures out south. It was getting dark when I hit the
bridge. If I hadn't been looking, I wouldn't have seen it.
That's how dark it was. The old truck was brown"

One of the three spoke up. "I didn't know you found the
wreck, Buck. You never said nothing about it"

Buck snorted and loosed a brown stream of tobacco onto
the sandy floor. He reached for the twine banding a bale
of hay and fumbled in his pocket. "Nothing to talk about.
Chester was dead when I got down there. Started to strike a match to see, but gas was everywhere. I went back to my
truck for a flashlight. Blood all over the place. Run all down
his ears and neck" He jerked his hand from his pocket and
muttered a sharp curse. "Lost that knife again"

"Here" I handed him mine, an old Case with the shield
missing on the handle. "What did the pickup do, just go
straight down into the creek?"

The other three moved a step closer, curious.

Buck cut the twine. He glanced at me and grinned.
"Sharp"

"My grandpa would kick my tail if it wasn't."

He chuckled and tossed pieces of the bale onto the conveyor as he continued. "Chester must have bounced off the
tree, then banged over the rocks until he slid nose first down
into the creek" He paused and cut another bale free. "You
boys know how steep it is there, where the creek bends just
before the old bridge. I caught a glimpse of the pickup. I
didn't recognize it, but I did Mr. Chester when I found
him. He was facedown on the steering wheel, strapped in by
his seat belt and deader than five-day-old roadkill. Must've
slammed his head into the steering wheel mighty hard"

A thought struck me. "Had you ever met Justin Chester?"

"Nope"

As we talked, he cut the remainder of the bales.

My next question was how he knew it was Justin. If he'd
banged his head on the wheel, then blood would have run
down his forehead and covered his face. "How'd you know
it wasn't someone else?"

He gave me an odd look. "I'd seen him around. Like I
said, never met him, but I'd seen him around" He looked at
the knife before folding it. "Old, huh?"

"Yep. My grandfather gave it to me"

He handed it to me. "Those Cases never wear out"

I agreed, then, dragging the fingers of my free hand from
my forehead down to my chin, asked, "Wasn't his face covered with blood?"

Impatiently, he replied, running a single finger behind each
ear and down his cheeks. "Like I just told you, the blood ran
down his ears and neck. His face was gray looking." He shivered. "First dead man I'd ever seen outside a funeral."

The hair on the back of my neck tingled.

My brain was turning out more questions than answers.
Only a contortionist could go headfirst down a steep embankment and not strike his forehead, unless he was already
dead for several hours and rigor had set in, keeping the body
stiff. And that might account for the coloring too.

"Anyway," he continued, "my cell phone was dead, so I
went up to Hooker's and called the sheriff. He was waiting
for me when I got back to the accident"

On impulse, I decided to take a look at the pickup. "Any
idea where they hauled the pickup?"

"Nope. Newt Gibons down at the mechanic's shop can tell
you. He has the local wrecker service. Probably to Johnson's,
but I ain't certain. You need to ask Newt"

I thanked Buck and left, not realizing that I was walking
into more trouble than I expected.

y first hint of trouble came when I pulled back onto
the highway and headed for Gibons' Automotive Shop. As I
drew near Hooker's on my left, I spotted a familiar car, a
white Cadillac convertible XLR. "Oh, no," I moaned, rolling
my eyes and hoping it didn't have a 4.6 L V-8 engine and
five-speed automatic. "Not Jack. Please, dear Lord, not Jack"

Reluctantly, I pulled into Hooker's and lowered the window. Even before I could climb out, I knew the good Lord
had decided not to grant my pleas. Jack Edney came rolling
out the door wearing a red Windbreaker, waving his short
arms enthusiastically. "Hey, Tony. Hi there. Surprised?"

Surprised was not the word I would have selected.
Stunned, staggered, or perhaps shocked. Any of the three
would have fit my current state of mind better than surprised.

"What are you doing up here, Jack?"

The curt tone of my voice didn't faze him. With a grin as
wide as the Colorado River, he replied. "Had to get away.
It's crazy down there"

I arched an eyebrow. "Diane?"

He nodded. "Yeah. I need a break, Tony. That's the
gospel" He stood there with a hangdog expression on his
face. I studied him for several moments, remembering my
despair, my melancholy the last few months I spent with
Diane. And it wasn't all her fault. She was as uncomfortable with me. It's a shame marriages deteriorate into such a
state. I suppose it's because neither wants to admit failure,
and the situation goes from bad to worse. Finally, with a
slow shake of my head, I mumbled, "Move your car around
to the side of the store out of traffic, and get in"

When he clambered into the pickup cab, he brought
along his ubiquitous ice chest. And unless I missed my
guess, it was stocked with Budweiser. "I'm ready. Let's go"
He grinned.

Newt Gibons' shop had three bays, all full with Buck
Ford's trucks. A box-shaped portable propane heater sent
out a stream of warm air swirling about the cavernous building. Jack waddled over in front of it and rubbed his hands
together.

Gibons was a closemouthed little man about five-six
and wearing baggy overalls. "Yep," he replied, wiping at
the grease on his hands when I asked him if he'd towed the
wrecked pickup.

"Mind telling me where you hauled it? His family wanted
me to look through the glove compartment"

"Ain't nothing in it. Inside's covered with blood. Sheriff
sent all the stuff in it to the family"

I shrugged indifferently. "I know it's a waste of time, but
they're paying me to look again. You know how it is"

He jammed a greasy rag into his hip pocket. "Nope. Don't
reckon I do"

At that moment, the back door creaked open. The old
man I'd spotted ambling down the road the previous day
when I was filling up with gas at Hooker's shuffled in. He
paused, his rheumy eyes focused on Newt Gibons. "Got it
cleaned up, Newt"

Newt glanced at me. "Just a minute." He fished a few
dollars from his pocket and handed them to the old man.
"Okay, Harlan. Come back next week, you hear?"

The old man nodded slowly.

After he left. Newt explained. "Old Harlan Barton. Town
drunk. Lives out near the cemetery. Family lived out there
since I don't know when. He's the last of the Bartons. Sold
off everything except his shack. Cleans up oil cans and
stuff out back for a few bucks"

I nodded. "So, where can I find it?"

For a moment, he didn't understand the question. Then
he remembered. "You mean the pickup?"