The Right Side of Wrong (17 page)

Chapter Twenty-five

One week later all hell broke loose not far from our house.

It was after dark and Grandpa was out on a call somewhere. Pepper and I were in the living room, trying to tune the antenna to pick up American Bandstand. Grandpa wouldn't let us watch it when he was home because he hated rock and roll music, but Miss Becky said it was alright as long as we didn't turn it up too loud.

She answered after the second ring, because we weren't supposed to pick up the calls after dark. She listened for a minute, and then sat down heavily at the telephone table. I quit fooling with the electric rotor.

She'd heard about everything on that black rotary phone, but this time she was stunned. She quickly hung up and dialed. “James, hon, you need to get over here.”

It was that fast. She hung up and dialed again. The phone must have rung a long time before she hung up. Miss Becky figured we were dying to know. “Kids, there's been a bad wreck at the creek bridge and they think your Aunt Sylvia has drowned.”

Memories of our visit to her house washed over me, but I didn't say a word.

The phone rang again. The community grapevine was cranking up. A car rolled up the gravel drive when she picked up the receiver and headlights reflected through the windows. “See who it is, hon.”

No one had ever told me to go to the door after dark, so I knew something really bad was happening. When I flicked on the porch light, Hootie was barking at Jimmy Foxx and his brother Ty Cobb.

Ty Cobb threw up his hand in a quick wave from their truck and turned off their headlights that nearly blinded me. “Top, do you know where Mr. Ned is?” They'd seen his car was gone.

“Nossir.”

“Well, there's been a bad wreck at the creek and we're looking for him. You tell him to come on to the bridge when he comes back home.”

Throwing their truck into reverse, they threw gravel as they shot down the drive and turned toward the store.

Miss Becky was still on the phone when I came back into the living room. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she talked. For once, Pepper didn't have much to say. She sat there and listened to our end of the conversation.

Another car crunched up the gravel drive, and in minutes Uncle James was in the house. “What is it, Mama?”

She momentarily forgot she was talking on the phone. “James, your Aunt Sylvia was coming back from across the river with Leon Fergus. I reckon he was drunk and lost control of the car. They missed the bridge and went off in the creek, and she drowned when it flipped upside down.”

He left without a word. We heard his car hit the highway. The engine roared.

I swear, our little house on the hill was a magnet for every car that came down the road that wanted to stop in for a minute, folks clucking their tongues in pity before leaving.

Grandpa came to check with Miss Becky on his way to the accident. “Did y'all hear anything?”

“Nary sound.”

“We did.” Pepper said.

She and I heard a pop, but figured it was somebody shooting. There wasn't a day that went by in Center Springs you didn't hear the sounds of gunfire. Most men carried at least a .22 in their trucks for varmints, and there were more than a few rusty revolvers in the pigeon holes. People up north called it a glove box, but Grandpa's were usually full of trash, tools, and papers, especially rolled up wanted posters, but never gloves.

“How many times. You know where it came from?”

I wished I could help, but what we heard was no more than a crack. “Just one, but we couldn't tell where it came from.”

Grandpa knew what we were saying. One pop late in the day was nothing.

In the kitchen, he took a long drink of ice water from the dipper, then put it back beside the bucket. “Leon and Sylvia were coming back over the creek bridge from Juarez.” He wiped a drop from his chin. “A car coming the other way made a U-turn past the bridge when Leon's Oldsmobile topped the hill. He was going way too fast, and swerved at the last minute. He lost control and flipped into the creek. They were trapped in the car and drowned.”

He stopped for a moment. I thought he'd seen a scorpion on the wall, but there wasn't anything there. “My lord, they run off together and didn't get five miles from home. They were looking for bright lights and a big two-story house, and all they found was a dirty honky-tonk and this.”

He studied the dark television screen. “This has happened before. What did y'all hear after that pop?”

“I didn't hear nothing, but the kids saw a car go past.”

I shrugged when he raised his eyebrows. I hated not being able to tell who passed below the hill to our house, because Grandpa always asked who it was. “A car went by a minute later and somebody honked the horn, but we were trying to tune the tee vee and didn't look.”

He sighed. “Mama, put your pistol in your pocket and watch for whoever drives up.”

Miss Becky set her jaw, went straight to the kitchen, and took her .25 automatic from the drawer in the china cabinet. Grandpa was already backing down the drive when she latched the hook on the screen door.

Pepper whispered in my ear. “That little metal hook ain't gonna stop nothing bigger'n that damn monkey Tarzan carries around.”

Sometimes Pepper aggravated me for real. “It might slow a bad guy down for a minute.” I pointed to the loaded shotgun in the corner, and we both knew a .22 rifle stood against the kitchen door frame.

The phone rang again, and Miss Becky answered. “I know, honey. It's just awful…”

Unconsciously rubbing the scar on the back of her shoulder, Pepper hugged herself and went to stare out the south window at the ribbon of highway past the yard.

We were once again locked in the house with our grandmother and several loaded guns.

Chapter Twenty-six

Judge O.C. Rains joined the lawmen at the creek bridge. Headlights lit the scene. “Ned, Cody, y'all tell me what you got.”

Knees aching, Ned had been leaning on his elbows over the hood of a car, talking with the others about what had happened. “What'n hell you doing out here tonight?”

“It don't take much to put two and two together. Even I know an ambush when I hear about one, only this time it worked. Y'all have any idea what's going on?”

Worried, Cody chewed the inside of his lip. It was beginning to get sore from all the thinking, and he figured he'd have an ulcer in there by the end of the night. “You're right, judge. At first we thought it was an accident, that Leon was drunk and ran off the road, and he was probably drunk all right, but there's a bullet hole in their windshield and it didn't come from inside.”

A long line of drag marks led from the creek to the highway where Isaac Reader had used Ned's tractor to pull the car from the water.

Cody stared down at the marks as if they held a clue to the murder. “They done took him and Sylvia to the funeral home. That would have been me a few months ago if Tom hadn't showed up when he did.”

“'I god, first her boy and now her. Y'all think it was Ben done it?”

“He probably thought about it, but naw, it wasn't him.”

Ned unconsciously jiggled the loose change in his pants pocket. “It was the same ones who shot at Cody there. It's Whitlatch and his men, but I'll be damned if I know why.”

“I do.”

Tom Bell stood behind them.

O.C was unfazed at Tom's sudden appearance. It seemed as if he were expecting him.

“Whitlatch and his cronies are working with somebody in Chisum to move marijuana up here from Mexico. They're also starting a new business where they're growing their own.”

Ned felt his face flush. “How do you know all this?”

“I used to be in a business down south that knew a lot about what's coming across the border. Since I retired, I kinda keep my hand in, just to know what's going on.”

“Why'nt you tell us this before, Tom?”

“I only found out about half an hour ago, when a friend of mine called and told
me
. It's a good thing I got that phone put in yesterday. I have electricity now, too.”

“Just what business were you in?”

“O.C., I'd rather not say right now, but I can give you the name of a couple good men in south Texas who'll vouch for me. There's one more thing, y'all ain't gonna like one little bit. The ramrod for the outfit up here ain't Whitlatch, he's just a gofer for somebody else, but I don't have any idea who it is.”

“I'll find out,” Ned said.

Tom chuckled. “I have no doubt you will.”

“That matches up with what Mark Lightfoot told us,” Cody said. “Now I believe his story. The kid knew more than us. Ain't that a kick?”

A pair of headlights appeared over the hill, underneath a revolving ball mounted to the roof. Cody crossed his arms and rested his hip against a car. “Boys, this just went sour.”

Sheriff Griffin stepped out of the car, adjusted his hat, and strolled toward the accident scene as if going to the store. Deputy White still looked miserable in his role as driver.

White shook Cody's hand and spoke softly. Both men assumed positions against the car to view the continuing battle between Ned and Griffin. Ned planted his feet and waited for Griffin to close the gap between them. When he was close enough, Griffin took a deep breath to begin the skirmish and the huge form of John Washington appeared from the darkness, drawing Griffin's ire.

“Washington, what the hell are you doing way out here? Isn't this out of your jurisdiction?”

O.C. waved an arm as if at an annoying mosquito. “I sent him out.” The statement wasn't completely true, yet it wasn't untrue, either. He'd sent John out to Center Springs on a number of occasions, so technically, he was still out on an older call.

John hadn't expected to be attacked by Griffin, but it wasn't a total surprise. He stayed out of the sheriff's way as much as possible, knowing Griffin had no use for his only colored deputy, and even less use for the people who lived on the south side of the tracks.

John spoke softly, with restrained respect, but his stance between Constable Parker and the sheriff couldn't have been any clearer. Either consciously or unconsciously, he intended to block Griffin from getting close to Ned. It was an instinctive ballet of territorial defiance on the empty highway.

“Nawsir, I ‘spect I go where I'm needed. You know that. I heard on the radio what had happened here not far from Mr. Ned's house. Mr. O.C. talked to me on the radio a little bit ago, so here I am. And since one of our constables was shot at not long ago, I figgered I'd hurry and help a fellow lawman best I can.”

Griffin struggled to find fault with the statement, but to his aggravation, John was right. Sheriff's deputies served the entire county, as Griffin's presence proved, even though John's territory was unofficially south of the tracks. The sheriff had already defeated his own argument by being there.

“We don't need every deputy I have out here,” Griffin sputtered.

“I'll go.”

The sheriff pondered the suggestion for a moment. “No, I'll go. Have a complete typewritten report on my desk first thing in the morning.” He knew as well as Ned and O.C. that John had never written a report on a typewriter in his life, and the deadline was impossible. “I want to know why they were out here, where they were coming from, what happened, and a list of suspects.”

“You'll have it,” O.C. interrupted. He intended to write the report himself.

Griffin hooked both thumbs behind the hand-tooled gun belt and rocked back and forth for a moment. He hadn't considered O.C. butting in. “You people out here in Center Springs think y'all have your own little kingdom, don't you? But before long, I'm gonna tear y'all's playhouse down.”

Tom Bell waited to see if anyone was interested in relaying the information he'd just given them. Griffin finally noticed the old man standing close by. “Who are you?”

“Nobody.”

“You have some reason to be here?”

Tom's eyes displayed his annoyance. “Don't need one. Unless I woke up in Russia this morning, I can be anywhere I want.”

“Well, we don't need any old ranchers gettin' in the way of an investigation.”

“Don't worry about me, sheriff. I know my place.”

Griffin hooked his thumbs in the gun belt around his waist. “Is there anything else I need to know before I leave?”

When no one answered, Griffin avoided the increasingly uncomfortable silence by flipping a hand for White and returning to his car, shouldering past the Wilson brothers. White raised an eyebrow in apology, slid behind the wheel, and they left behind a crowd of very irritated citizens.

Tom Bell watched White turn around, barely missing the deep ditch that would have without a doubt stuck the sheriff's car. “Your sheriff don't seem to be a particularly friendly feller, does he?”

“No he ain't,” Ned rubbed his face. “I don't give a shit about him, but he does a good job there in town, for a City Feller.”

As if those last two words explained everything, the men working the accident scene went back to sorting out the details. Thinking, Cody stood on the solid yellow line painted down the middle of the highway. He stared down the arrow-straight ribbon of concrete that disappeared into darkness. Behind him, the hill rose sharply.

“This is all coming to a head, and I can't figure out what's happening.”

Ned joined him. “It seems to me Whitlatch is clearing his field before he plows.”

“What do you mean?”

Tom stepped close. “He means, son, that when Whitlatch is finished, there won't be anyone left to tie him to this drug operation, or to them they've killed to get rid of the competition, right? I been keeping up with what's in the papers. Dead moonshiners, until there ain't no more whiskey stills around here. Then the drug system is set up, and when it's in place, them that worked on it are gone, along with anyone who knew or suspected anything about their comings and goings, like these poor folks here. It leaves only the hired hands on the bottom, Whitlatch in the middle, and Mr. I Don't Know Who He Is on top. It ain't nothin' new.”

“Tom, how the hell do you know all of this? What ain't you tellin' us?”

He sighed. “Ned, I was a lawman down south. I came up here to retire and get out of misfortune such as this, but it looks like I moved smack in the middle of the exact things that made me old before my time.”

The men standing around completely missed the dismissive comment. “What branch? Were you a constable or something?”

An extremely private person, Tom held back even more with the Parkers. They'd find out soon enough. “Can't say, as of yet, but you can call down south if you really want to know my bonafides. They won't tell you much, just that I wore a badge. Now let me help you without too many more questions.”

“Well I have a couple more, if you don't mind.”

Tom Bell gave Ned the briefest of nods. “I'll answer what I can.”

“Why are you here?”

“I been asked to follow some drugs up here from the Valley. That's all I can say on that subject.”

“You cain't leave us with that. Give us a little more.”

Tom started to say more, but then he shook his head and backed up a step, as if that distance would keep him from talking too much. “I just gave you all I got to give, right now.”

Tilting his hat back, Ned rubbed at his forehead. “You carried a badge, but you're out of the bidness, you know things we don't about this marywana, but you won't tell us no more.”

“Only that you can trust me.”

“All right, then, but we're still lawmen and we have that behind us. What can
you
do?”

Tom gave them a chilling look. “What you can't.”