Only the Truth (17 page)

"I was in a mood one day," she told me, "and I realized that
our story started at the end if the newest pictures were on the top. So I took
them all out and put the recent ones at the bottom." She sighed.
"Funny, I did that just before the fire, like I knew there wasn't going to
be any reason to add any more pictures anyhow."

We became quieter as we got into their last year together. Rubin was still
smiling,
smilng
in every picture, like he didn't have
a care in the world and there was nothing going on that would ruin everyone's
life.

There were just a few photos left scattered on the cardboard bottom.

Mrs. Covey pulled out the largest one and handed it to me.

"Our last summer together," she said bitterly. "We took a
picnic to the river.
Rubin acted like he was twenty years old
again, singing to me, and chasing me in and out of the trees, well, as fast as
we could run at our age."
Her voice softened and she stared off toward
the ceiling, lost in the memory of Rubin when he wasn't the creep he had
become.

I looked down at the photo. They were all smiles as usual. Rubin didn't have
much hair left and Mrs. Covey's black hair had a good amount of gray in it. The
sun glinted off their faces….must have been after they had their romping about.

"Billy Ray?"

I felt like I was stuck in a place where there was no time.

I felt giddy.

"Billy Ray?" Mrs. Covey was shaking me. I wondered if she would
slap me on the side of the head like she had done at our first meeting.

"Billy Ray? What is it?"

I blinked and stared at the photo again.

"Do you recognize Rubin, Billy Ray?"

I shook my head no.

I pointed to his teeth.

"Mrs. Covey? Are they real?"

"What?" She started laughing.
"His teeth?
Goodness, I thought you had seen a ghost, Billy Ray!"

"Are the real?" I asked her again.

"Hell, no!
Who around here has their real
teeth past the age of fifty?"

"Did Mr. Stoddard have false teeth too?" I found myself staring at
Mrs. Covey's teeth.

"Well, heck, I don't know," she said.
"Probably.
Maybe.
What's gotten into you?"

I breathed in once, twice. I pointed to Rubin Covey's mouth.

"He's got a chip in his tooth under his right cheek."

Mrs. Covey shrugged. "Yeah, he chipped one of his denture teeth on a
bottle cap he was twisting off in his mouth. He didn't want to pay to have it
fixed."

"You know that man Char...Kristen...killed in Arkansas?"

Mrs. Covey nodded and waited.

"He had false teeth just like this. He had a chip right there,
too," and I pointed to the spot again.

Mrs. Covey looked confused.

"Are you saying that man was Rubin?" She
squinched
up her nose and she fought to remember the details. "Didn't you say it was
some old white man Kristen had a run in with just before she met you?"

I nodded. "Yeah, he was white."

Mrs. Covey
wasn't understanding
what I was trying
to get at. I wasn't too sure myself; it was still stuck in the back of my mind,
like those stars hiding behind the clouds.

I looked at Rubin's teeth in the photo and I could see those teeth in that
skeleton in the photo Mr. Stanley had forced me to look at. They were the same
teeth. I knew they were.

I got to my knees and then stood up, holding the picture in my hand.

"We
gotta
go see Chief Williams."

Mrs. Covey looked at me strangely, but went and got her coat, purse, and
keys.

She didn't stick to the speed limit.

********************

Chief Williams was talking to one of his men just inside the lobby of the
building. He stopped abruptly when he saw the two of us come in and pushed the
officer away.

He put his hands on his hips.

"Did you find your lost relative, Hutchins?"

I walked right up to him.

"I need you to call Sheriff Hathaway in Whitfield Glen."

He got a puzzled look and seemed like he was about to cuss me out, but then
he changed his mind.

I must have looked real serious.

"Let's go to my office." The Chief led us back through the door
with the silver rectangle on it and seated us in the two chairs opposite his
desk.

I sat there with the picture clutched between my hands. He reached over for
it and pulled it out of my grip.

He didn't look impressed.

"It's Rubin and Alma."

"Please, call the Sheriff."

He picked up the phone, talked to information, and told them to put him
through to the Sheriff's Department in Whitfield Glen.

I looked over at Mrs. Covey. She was sitting like a statue or someone who
had accidentally gotten on a bus, didn't know where it was going, and couldn't
get off.

The Chief had gotten through.

"This is Police Chief Williams over in Jenkins, Tennessee. I need to
speak to the Sheriff." There was about a minute of silence.

"Sheriff?
This is Police Chief Williams
calling you from Jenkins, Tennessee. I am with one Billy Ray Hutchins...yeah, I
said Billy Ray Hutchins...well, yes,
he
came in
yesterday, no, the day before yesterday, asking a whole bunch of questions
about Kristen Stoddard."

I reached across the table and waved my hand under the Chief's face.

"What?" he barked at me. "Wait one minute, Sheriff, Billy Ray
is...what is it, Billy Ray?"

"Can you send him the picture?" I asked.

The Chief threw up his hands. "Is there a purpose in this, Hutchins?
Apparently, you're not going to tell me." He pushed the mouthpiece back
under his chin.
"Sheriff?
You got a fax number?
Uh...huh…okay...," he scribbled on a notepad. "Could you hold on for
that, Sheriff?" He put the phone down on the desk, got up and opened the
door.

"Ramirez?
Rameeeerez
!"

An officer probably named Ramirez appeared and the Chief handed him the
photo and the number he had scribbled down and told the officer to fax it right
away.

He sat back down and picked up the phone.

"Okay, Sheriff, it's coming to you now."

We waited a few minutes.

"You got it? Yeah, it's a photo of the guy in the newspaper who Kristin
ran off with...ah, yeah, that's his wife."

He glanced up momentarily at Mrs. Covey but she didn't move a muscle.

He looked over at me.

"And?"

"Tell the Sheriff to go find the picture of that burned up skull of the
old man that Charlene...Kristen...killed."

The Chief shook his head at me but repeated what I said to the Sheriff.

We sat in silence, the Chief leaning on his left elbow, holding the phone up
to his ear. He gazed over my head at the wall behind me.

I saw him sit up a little and his eyes widened a bit.

"Holy Shit!
You
gotta
be kidding me! What the hell?"

He shook his head violently. His voice got loud.

"What
friggin
' DNA tests on the corpses? You
think we have money for that here in Jenkins? Hell, did you do DNA tests on
your corpse? I didn't damn well think so. Besides, we had no question. They
were husband and wife, together in their bed. Covey was seen in the car with
Kristen. It was Kristen and a black man. No, it was two people who testified to
that. No, they didn't see the black man. It was night. They saw a man that was
dark enough not to look white."

He was standing up now, pacing back and forth in the space between the desk
and his chair.

Chief Williams rubbed his free hand from his hairline down over his chin. He
couldn't stop shaking his head.

"Goddamn it to hell! No wonder we couldn't find Covey and Kristen.
There was no Covey and Kristen. No black guy, white girl. Shit! Goddamn it!
Shit!"

He finally stopped swearing and dropped back down into his chair.

"Yeah, yeah, we're on our way, Sheriff. It will be worth the
trip." He hung up the phone.

He cocked his head and looked at me. "You figured this out?
You?"

I didn't say anything and suddenly the Chief became aware of Mrs. Covey
again, sitting stone still in front of him.

He bit his lip.

"Mrs. Covey," he said softly. "Your husband...Rubin...he
didn't run away with Kristen."

Mrs. Covey gave him a blank stare.

The Chief started over.

"Mrs. Covey, your husband hasn't been on the run for the last four
years. He died that night in the fire at the Stoddard's. I don't know why he
was there but he was the man who was killed, not Kristen's father. Her father
was the one that drove off with her.

Mrs. Covey found her voice just a little bit. "But, there was a black
man in the car with Kristen, wasn't that what people said?"

Chief Williams nodded.

"Yes and no. The witnesses saw Kristen and they knew it was her. But the
man just appeared not to be white to them. All I can figure at this point is
that Mr. Stoddard wiped soot on his face to disguise himself, to make people
think he was the one killed in the fire and Rubin was the one taking off with
Kristen."

Mrs. Covey whispered softly, "Then my Rubin is dead?"

"Yes, Mrs. Covey."

"Dead."
You could tell she was having
trouble fixing that idea in her head. "He was dead all along. And all
these years I've been mad at him for killing those kids and running away. And
he didn't do it." Her voice started breaking. "Maybe he was still a
sinner for messing with that young girl but at least he wasn't
no
baby killer." The tears were spilling down her
cheeks now and as she sat there and sobbed and muttered her husband's name over
and over, the Chief and I got lost in our own thoughts.

********************

I never knew a woman could cry for so long but Mrs. Covey had a whole lot to
cry about so she didn't stop for the better part of an hour. Finally, she ran
out of energy and tears, and the Chief got up and helped her from her chair.

Before we left the office, Chief Williams told us he was heading to Arkansas
to talk with the Sheriff and compare notes. He wanted to talk to Charlene, too.

He looked at me.

"I assume you want a ride back, Hutchins?" He wasn't actually
asking me a question, just stating a fact.

"Mrs. Covey?" He took one of her hands. "Normally, I wouldn't
do this, but I feel I owe you a bit of an apology for dogging you these last
years
over where Rubin was. So, if you would like to go
along for the ride to Arkansas, you are welcome to come. The department will
cover the hotel bill when we get to
Whitfeld
Glen."

She nodded immediately.

"I want to go. Now I am like Billy Ray here. I need answers and maybe I
will find them in Arkansas."

Chief Williams laughed, not at Mrs. Covey, but just because he couldn't
believe what was happening.

"Strangest damn case I've ever seen," he said later that afternoon
as we piled into the police cruiser. Mrs. Covey sat up front and I sat behind
her. I was lucky it was the Chief's car and was one of those fancy unmarked
ones or I would have been riding in the cage.

"Let's go," he said, and we headed west on Route 40 and in three
or four hours I would be home. As we started, I wasn't really sure I wanted to
get there considering I didn't know what had changed for the better. Charlene
was still a killer and everyone around her was still dead. Maybe when I met
Charlene this time, I will see her for what she is
today,
the twenty-one-year-old bad Charlene - I think that is her age now - and I will
just come back to Jenkins and forget she ever existed.

********************

VII

"I don't understand something!" Mrs. Covey blurted out an hour
into the trip.

"What was Stoddard doing with my husband's false teeth?"

Chief Williams chuckled.

"I would guess he took them out of Rubin's mouth because he didn't want
to leave anything that would be easily recognized or traced. But why he decided
to use them
himself
, your guess is as good as mine.
Dentures are fitted to a person's mouth so wearing somebody else's usually
doesn't work out too well. Maybe Stoddard just got lucky and they fit
good
. Must have lost
his own somewhere
along the way
."

"By the way," the Chief looked over his right shoulder at me.
"What's up with your Rubin connection?"

"We didn't find a thing," I told him.

"I can vouch for that," said Mrs. Covey. "We spent the whole
morning going through Rubin's family tree and nothing fell out and landed on Billy
Ray."

"Huh."

Chief Williams dropped the subject which surprised me.

We passed over the Mississippi River from Tennessee to Arkansas about six
o'clock. We stopped for a little dinner and after getting our stomachs a bit
full, Mrs. Covey fell asleep. We could hear her
snoring
just a little bit every minute or so.

"Billy Ray."

I lifted my head up from where it had settled on the window.

"Yeah, Chief?"

This time Chief Williams didn't look over at me but looked straight ahead at
the road.

"I'm going to be straight with you. I still have a murder investigation
that's my responsibility. Don't get the impression that just because I can be
friendly toward you that I am not paying attention to what you do." He
glanced in the rear view mirror and his eyes met mine for a moment. "Right
now, the only suspect in the Stoddard family murders and the murder of Rubin
Covey is Kristen. She is also the only suspect in the murder of Mr. Stoddard.
The guy that we thought was Kristen’s partner in crime is dead. The guy that
was Kristin's actual partner, her father, is also dead because she made sure of
that."