The Blackstone Commentaries (39 page)

“Mr. Setzer's here, sheriff.”

He hadn't even noticed the time. The sun was almost down, and shadows were taking over the streets. He could feel an autumn chill through the open window. He'd called Herb Setzer down at Damascus Chicken that morning, and his secretary said he was out of town for the day. But when Charlie had told her what it was about, she'd called back about an hour later
saying Mr. Setzer could be there around six-thirty, if that was all right. He would come downtown and save the sheriff a trip to the factory.

Herb Setzer was one of the two brothers who owned Damascus Chicken, the one who oversaw the day-to-day physical operation and had the practical sense of how things worked, or ought to. He entered the office with an insurance adjuster in tow, the two bringing in a cool smell of evening. “Sorry for the late hour, Charlie.”

Dugan indicated the empty chairs across his desk, and the men seated themselves. He knew Setzer, a Republican Party man, about fifty, hardworking, a bit pudgy, bald. He wore a sports coat and tie over a white shirt with a pocketful of pens and pencils. The adjuster, from Durham, was wearing slacks and a sports coat, too, a light beige coat against a nice blue shirt. He even had a tan to match his seedy athletic appearance, and a look in his eye that suggested he'd seen just about everything the world had to offer. The way he took his seat, like he was born to such surroundings and couldn't be intimidated, told Dugan a lot. “You were in law enforcement?” he asked. The adjuster smiled. “I received a call from Pennsylvania this morning, Herb,” Dugan began.

“That's what my secretary said. From the state police up there.”

“Yes. They said they found one of your trailers back in the pucker-brush at some old coal mine. The roof was peeled right off. The smell of those chickens—what, twelve-or-so thousand?—was so bad they had to go in with masks. They said every buzzard east of the Mississippi had come to the banquet, that that's how they found it. And because I didn't know one was missing, I didn't know what the hell they were talking about. You mind filling me in?” He let a little irritation show.

“Charlie, I apologize,” Setzer said. “I was told that trailer had been hijacked—state police up there told me themselves—and I was disinclined to make an insurance claim for it, because it was old and my rates would have gone up more than the damn thing was worth.”

“Well, now they have a warrant out for the driver.”

“That Skinner fellow?” the adjuster asked.

Dugan turned to the man. “Did you know about this?”

The adjuster nodded, the two men holding each other's gaze a moment, sizing each other up.
These pissing contests get old
, Dugan thought.

“I talked to Frank here right after I got the call from Skinner, oh, maybe
three or four weeks ago, when it happened,” Setzer explained. “I just didn't see any need to bother you. It had been hijacked, for all I knew, and in Pennsylvania, not North Carolina.”

“Might have had a leg up on this if you'd called, Herb, just to keep me filled in.” He wouldn't have bought any damn story about a stolen trailer load of chickens, that's for sure, not from Skinner. “We've been looking at Skinner for other reasons.”

“Yes, I saw in the paper he was involved in some fracas with that young Reedy and his wife. Well, I am truly sorry, Charlie. Not only does it turn out it wasn't stolen, I'm facing a huge bill for the cleanup.”

“I expect he's somewhere here in the county, Herb, but I don't know for sure,” Dugan said, beginning to feel somewhat mollified.

The adjuster broke in. “What makes those Pennsylvania officials so sure Skinner's responsible?”

“Seems about the same time that trailer was reported hijacked, they found the remains of a trailer roof lying in the road under a railroad trestle near Goshen, Virginia,” Dugan said. “They couldn't put it all together until they found the trailer and chickens.”

“Where the hell is Goshen?”

“In the mountains above Lexington, thirty or so miles north of I-81. And a long way from Pennsylvania, I might add.”

“He was supposed to be going to New York. What was he doing in Goshen?”

“Skinner?” Dugan shrugged. “Anyone's guess. Woman, maybe. We catch him, you're sure free to ask.”

“Ever since Skinner called reporting it hijacked, Charlie, I've been asking myself why anyone would steal a truckload of chickens,” Setzer said. “Not like whiskey or cigarettes. In a way, I'm relieved they found it.”

“Where did he say it was stolen?”

“Near Harrisburg, at a motel,” Setzer said. “At the time, he told me he went to sleep late, woke up and found the trailer gone. State police confirmed that's what he told them. Said he called them soon as he discovered it. Hijacking's not all that rare up there, I guess, and they confirmed he was pretty upset. He'd been doing all right for us, and I guess he was afraid I was going to fire him.”

“Did you?” the adjuster asked.

“I didn't have any reason to doubt the man. Anyhow, he resigned a week or two back. I assumed he just felt bad about the whole thing. Amazing he drove that far with no roof without being caught, but it was nighttime.”

“Now, if he said he'd broken down on Flatbush Avenue …,” the adjuster observed, slouching in his chair a bit, beginning to enjoy himself.

“Where?” Setzer asked, annoyed by the introduction of levity. The more he thought about it, Dugan saw, the more upset Setzer was becoming.
Well, it's somebody else's turn
.

“Up in New York. Kids'll strip anything that moves. You told me this Skinner was a good driver. Any prison record, Herb? Debts? Did you check when you hired him?” The adjuster folded his hands over his stomach, his questions revealing polite but definitely amused curiosity. This was shaping up to be one for the books.

Setzer looked doubtfully at Dugan, began to say something, then stopped himself.

“Well?” the adjuster prompted.

“Well, Frank, he buried this ol' boy alive at the county fair this past summer, made thousands of dollars on it, so I assumed his credit was good.”

“He
what
?” The adjuster turned his look of astonishment from Setzer to Dugan. “Where am I?”

“He served time in Burnsville,” Dugan added, suddenly enjoying himself.

Dugan followed Setzer and the adjuster out to the parking lot, where they all shook hands, then watched the brake lights of Setzer's Ford go bright in the darkness as it glided out of the parking lot onto North Charlotte Street. Setzer didn't want to bother the law unless there was something to bother the law about. Dugan shook his head.
How many times have I heard that?

“Sheriff?” the radio operator called as he reentered the jail. “Junior called in, believes he's found Skinner.”

“Where, Ranny?”
Why does this feel bad?

“In Jessup, at Puma's house. He called Stamey and J. B. for backup.”

“Does anybody call me anymore, not to mention wait for my decision?”

“Why, sheriff, you were out in the parking lot with Mr. Setzer there.”

“Get on that horn and tell Junior not to do a
goddamn
thing till I get there, hear? Not even move! Where's Eddie?”

“Junior was getting out of the car when he called, sheriff. Don't believe I can raise him.”

XLI

Dugan

“County Three, County Three …”

Silence.

“County Four, you
there
?”

Eddie was driving, the needle creeping up over a hundred, then falling back, the silence between Dugan in the rear seat and his driver tense, smothering the prattle of the radio.

He could see it was taking all Eddie's concentration just to drive. There'd been a shower, and the highway was still slick in places. It seemed darker than dark itself, everything feeling on the far edge of control. He saw Eddie lean forward slightly in an effort to clarify the world rushing out of the darkness at them, as though he were half-expecting it all to fly to pieces.

Dugan was dying to crack a window so the autumn night might pour into the cabin, wash away this feeling of blind rushing, make it all okay again, the way it once and for so long had been, back when they could go
looking for the top of the world, when they had the peace and confidence to do that.

Instead he remained in the uneasy silence, the radio, everything, feeling more shaky than ever, Ranny's periodic, futile intrusions a reminder of just how far beyond his control everything had gone, how events were not only eluding him now, but trapping him, too, like muck. Yet he was riveted by their flight, by the precariousness of everything that bound him to everything else in this world, by gravity itself. Their blue light fled across old fields to disappear in a darkness devoid of trees, altitude and deep pine smell, of any hint of the top of any world. The car, symbol of authority and success, was making him a fool.

He could feel Eddie's small body upright and strained behind the wheel.
At least we can share the silence, because there's nothing to be said anymore, so there's truth in it. We just have to get to wherever we're going and see
.

“Dispatch to County Three. You there, J. B.? County Five? Stamey?”

Flying through the darkness, he began to feel dizzy, for there was no external measure of their passage, no trees or houses to give it reality. They were moving much too quickly toward something that he knew somehow had already evaded them and could never be grasped again. It was madness to even hurry. Playing catch-up. That had never been his way.

“County Four? Dispatch to County Four!
Junior
!” Longer silence. “County One?”

Without letting up on the gas, Eddie reached for the mike. As though a gust of wind had hit it, the Dodge rocked violently, then flew on, reminding Dugan how close to oblivion they were. “County One,” Eddie replied softly.

“County One, I can't raise no one at Puma's. I ain't heard nothing since you-all left. Should I keep trying?”

Ranny, please don't say any more for the benefit of all those good people listening out there in CB radio land. Please, don't say shit!

“That's affirm,” Eddie said, reading Dugan's mind.

“Received.”

Eddie clicked the mike. The car slowed for a turn down a side road, but it was still going too fast. Dugan felt the back end of the big car begin to slide, and then they were drifting sideways toward a ghostly thicket of trees, everything in slow motion, all the precariousness and hopelessness
suddenly looming over them. Eddie touched the accelerator, they came true and, amazed, Dugan looked back to see the thicket glow red, then fall behind into darkness. “Sorry,” Eddie said.

It can't go on like this. Something's got to give
. Now they were running in among scrub pines and sudden, steep red banks, an old barbed-wire fence. Eddie's silhouetted head fell out of focus.
I've got to get out of this car!

The road barreled through a tunnel of trees, skeletal vaulting sailing overhead, then burst into a mass of pulsating blue fire, and Dugan was out and running. Slamming a leg against the bumper of one of the parked cruisers, he limped a moment, then ran on, not fast because he was a big man now, cursing himself for his clumsiness and weight. But his progress was smooth, as though he were floating toward the wooden porch up the bank there, one corner of its roof sagging, propped by a two-by-four that was new, he noticed, because bathed in the headlights and the spotlight on Junior's car, it was still white, not the weathered, unpainted gray and brown of the house itself.

“You in there, come on out with your hands up!” Junior shouted. He was pointing his pistol at a faded wooden door, the pistol held way out in front, like he was of half a mind to run. His hat had fallen off, and his hair was askew.
Damn if he doesn't look like a kid confronting a cat with tin cans tied to its tail
, Dugan thought.

“Goddamnit, Trainor!” a voice, muffled but familiar, yelled inside. “I told you, they's no guns in here!”

“I have a felony warrant, Puma! You send Skinner out right now, hear? And you come on out, too, hands up! Harboring a fugitive!”

“Put that goddamn gun away first! You're crazy!”

Dugan grunted as he took the first step to the porch, the boards cracking under his weight as he shoved against Stamey Kibler, knocking him and the shotgun he was holding off the step.
Fuck it
, he thought, then, jamming an elbow into J. B.'s chest, roared, “
Junior!
” and plunged across the porch as the door opened and the darkness inside flowed out on a musty, sour odor, a startled, white face with it, Puma's face, Dugan thinking absurdly, W
here's that goddamn monkey?

A gun went off in his ear, and he spun around and fell backward through the dark door into all that despair, someone—Eddie?—shouting, “Oh, Christ, Trainor! What the
fuck
have you done now?”