TheCart Before the Corpse (28 page)

Sunday morning

Merry

“Want a job?” I asked Peggy on Sunday morning before I drove out to the farm to feed and clean stalls.

“What sort of job? I am not overly fond of manure.”

“Just think how great your garden will be this spring with all that well-rotted manure dug in.”

“Only if you do the digging. Assuming you’re still here, that is.”

All four cats sat in the kitchen doorway like a jury in a jury box. Dashiell’s tail lashed. He had a suspicion that whatever we were talking about would take Peggy’s lap away from him, and he didn’t like it.

“It’s your fault I have two lessons lined up this afternoon and four others to be scheduled during the week. Plus driving Heinzie and finishing the upholstery on the vis-à-vis. I’d pay you the same hourly wages I’m paying Jacob.”

“You don’t have to pay me. I enjoy being out there.”

“The Bible says the laborer is worthy of his hire. Or
her
hire. Besides, if I don’t hire you, I won’t ever be able to fire you if you piss me off.”

“What about if you piss
me
off?” Peggy said.

“Never happen. I am a joy to work for.” I smiled at her blandly. “And you can’t keep feeding me breakfast and making me sandwiches to take to the farm and half the time feeding me dinner too. I’d like to stop being a parasite.”

“We’re still living on funeral baked meats,” Peggy said. “Just like Hamlet’s mother and step-father.”

“How about a steak tonight?”

She shook her head. “I’ve got my usual Sunday dinner with my daughter and her family. Would you like to come? Marilee keeps hinting how much she wants to meet you, and my granddaughter wants to see the horses.”

“Thank them for me, but I’m going to go groom horses and get ready for my lessons this afternoon. Can I put off meeting your family until next Sunday? They can come applaud you while you drive Heinzie through the streets of Mossy Creek.”

“In the meantime, what happens if Whitehead shows up again?”

“I’ll shoot him.”

“Good idea. We can talk about the job tomorrow. I’ll come out after lunch today and help with the lessons, then we can pick up a pizza on the way home. Deal?”

“Deal.” I put my breakfast dishes in the dishwasher, scratched each cat behind the ears, and went to the farm.

This time I left the barn padlocked, and didn’t bother to lock Don Qui in his stall to eat. All the horses needed to be groomed, and the smaller Meadowbrook readied for my lessons. Horse people have to work on weekends. That’s when people with weekday jobs are available.

I’d be using Golden Boy, the Halflinger, and I wanted Peggy to drive him before my first student arrived, so I could get an idea of how well he obeyed a driver who actually
drove
him and didn’t fall on her face in the dirt.

After I ate my sandwiches, I decided to walk over to Jacob’s trailer. I knew he wasn’t there, but I hadn’t seen it close up, and had no idea how he got down his side of the mountain.

The trailer wasn’t new, but he and Hiram had removed the rust and repainted it, and the outside looked neat. Jacob had drawn all the curtains, so I couldn’t see inside. I did, however, find a newly-graveled parking area beside his front door and a rutted track that led down through the trees and presumably wound up on the same road Hiram’s driveway led to. The parking area might have been graveled at the same time as Hiram’s driveway, but Jacob’s road had not.

Hiram’s used tractor was parked over by his trailer, so I went back to inspect it and the attachments. The tractor lacked either a roll bar or air-conditioned driver’s cab. It did, however, possess a front loader, so that I could load manure from the pile to be spread in a month or so, a drag to keep the arena neat, a bush hog for the pastures, and the auger he and Hiram must have used to dig the post holes for the fences.

Nothing was new, but it looked clean and serviceable enough. I climbed onto the tractor, set the throttle and turned it the key. It started instantly. I was definitely coming to appreciate Jacob. Now if I could manage to endure his attitude and his alcoholism . . .

Looking back over the pasture, I could see the dressage arena and both the stable and the barn. At some point there had been a structure here. Parts of an old foundation showed back of the trailer, although the cellar, if there had been one, had long since been filled in. Whoever had built the house had chosen well. Jacob’s trailer had a perfect view of the whole place, and yet was far enough away to offer privacy.

If I planned to stay and run this place, I couldn’t keep living in Peggy’s basement and commuting. I’d need to build some kind of dwelling, and although I wasn’t certain I wanted to be so close to Jacob Yoder, the old house’s location seemed perfect. If I could sell my townhouse in Lexington—big
if
given the current real estate market—maybe I could afford to build one of those fancy pre-fab log houses. Maybe even get a dog that could go with me when I went to shows. Whitehead wouldn’t have walked in on me if I’d had a yappy little terrier.

*

My first lesson was with the veterinarian’s wife, Casey Blackshear. Dr. Blackshear offered to make me copies of everything he’d done for Hiram.

“I keep a computer file on my patients,” he said. “So I know when shots and Coggins tests are due. At the moment, we’re up to date until the end of May.”

“I’ll give you a call to schedule,” Casey said. She rolled her wheelchair over to the side of the arena where Peggy waited with Golden Boy put to the small Meadowbrook.

Good thing Dr. Blackshear came with her to lift her into the cart. The Meadowbrook was cumbersome with its rear entry, but he managed. I stood in the center of the ring and coached while Peggy sat beside Casey in case of trouble, but Golden Boy was as good as Peggy said he was.

After the lesson, I went over to talk to Casey. “You know, there’s a big group of, I don’t know the politically correct term these days . . . ”

Casey laughed. “Try physically challenged.”

“Okay. There’s an international group of physically challenged drivers with carriages specifically designed for wheelchairs. If you’re interested, I could look into the costs of one of the carriages for you.”

“I am
so
interested!” Casey said. “I can’t ride a horse and I love them to pieces. Driving would be perfect.”

“You can even show if you want to travel a bit. In the meantime, if you’re game to learn with a bigger horse like the Friesian, I think getting you in and out the larger cart might be easier.”

After settling her in their van, Dr. Blackshear squeezed my shoulder. “Let me know about the cost of a handicapped carriage. I think driving would make a world of difference to Casey. She’s always looking for new challenges.”

“That will be all over town before nightfall,” Peggy said as they drove away. “You’re going to have more lessons than you can handle.”

“No, more lessons than
you
can handle. Come on, time to drive Heinzie to the vis-à-vis.

The rest of the afternoon and my next lesson passed in a blur, and by the time I fell into bed after stuffing myself with pizza, I thought I’d fall asleep instantly. Instead, I worried. I didn’t see that we were one bit closer to finding out who killed my father. My father. When had I called him my father last?

Chapter 28

Monday morning

Merry

I am blessedly free from ESP, but something warned me to get my tail out to the farm on Monday morning. Jacob had not fed the horses, and Don Qui was telling me about it at the top of his lungs.

After taking care of the chores, fuming all the time, I strode over to Jacob’s trailer. His truck was there. The hood was cold, so he’d been home a while. I banged on his door. No answer. Either he was passed out inside, so hung over that he was hiding from me, or his tootsie had followed him home and taken him back to Bigelow in her car to drink some more. I tried the door of the trailer, but it was locked, and although in books anyone can pick a door lock with a hairpin, I didn’t have hairpins or the expertise Jacob had gained in the Joint.

My first lesson arrived before Peggy did. I had groomed Golden Boy and put him to the Meadowbrook, so I was ready. Eleanor Abercrombie didn’t want to drive alone, however, even in the dressage arena. I called Peggy on her cell. Quiet weather equaled cell reception on the mountain.

“Five minutes away. Where’s Jacob?” she asked.

“Bastard’s not here. Probably hungover at his ladyfriend’s house. I am
so
going to kill him when he shows up.”

Life would be much simpler if I could climb up onto the Meadowbrook beside Eleanor, pick up the reins, and drive off. I could take the chance of sitting beside Peggy. She knew what she was doing and wouldn’t expect me to take the reins. My disaster with Golden Boy had proved to me I wasn’t a bit closer to laying my demons.

When Jacob had not showed up by nightfall, I called Geoff Wheeler to ask him for his girlfriend’s telephone number.

“I’ll call her,” he said. He called back to say that whatever-her-name-was hadn’t seen Jacob since Sunday afternoon when he left her place to drive back to the farm.

“His truck’s here, but he isn’t,” I said. “Do you believe her? Maybe he decided to run for the hills and didn’t want to do it in a truck you could identify. Are there any car rental places in Bigelow? She could have followed him home to pack and leave his truck, then driven him back to Bigelow to rent a car or even catch the bus to Atlanta.”

“One of the sheriff’s people can check the car rentals and the bus terminal,” Geoff said. “That should make him feel a part of the investigation.” I could hear the sneer in his voice over the phone line. “If Yoder doesn’t show up by tomorrow, as his employer you can report him missing, and Amos and I can break into his trailer.”

“Don’t you need a warrant?”

“As his landlord you can give us permission. He could be passed out in there or worse. Want me to come break in now?”

“You know how an empty house feels empty?” I asked. “Jacob’s trailer feels that way, empty. He’s not inside.”

After I hung up, I sat on a bale of hay and took off my left paddock boot and sock very carefully. My foot still hurt.

My little toe was black and blue from the Meadowbrook but the swelling in my instep had gone down, revealing a perfect semi-circular bruise the size and shape of Don Qui’s left front hoof. He hadn’t broken the skin, but I’d have that bruise for a while. I hated to think how much damage he might have done if I’d been wearing Nikes instead of paddock boots.

I’d given up locking the damn animal in his stall to eat, but I’d have to lock him in tomorrow morning, if I could persuade Peggy to drive Heinzie down to the driveway.

Hopefully, Jacob would be back by then, but I didn’t think so. He was gone for good. Something had happened over the weekend to spook him so badly that he left his truck. It was a wreck, but it was drivable. As a parolee, he wasn’t supposed to leave his job or the area without permission. Either he’d rented, borrowed, or stolen a car, caught the Greyhound from Bigelow, or hitchhiked, unless someone from his old life helped him.

I didn’t know why he’d killed Hiram, but there was no reason for him to run if he wasn’t guilty. He must have thought that Geoff was closing in on him.

Geoff would have to catch him. I didn’t even know how to start.

To add to my troubles, I realized as I led Golden Boy back to the pasture that he was limping. I put the others out, tied him on the wash rack, and found that he had a swollen suspensory below his left knee. Not yet a bowed tendon, but if I left it untreated, it could easily bow. If that happened, he’d be laid up for six weeks to six months.

If, however, I could ice the leg down every couple of hours all night, I should be able to get the swelling and heat down by morning. Ordinarily, that would have been Jacob’s job, but no Jacob meant it had become mine.

The small refrigerator in the clients’ lounge had an icemaker that wouldn’t put out nearly the amount of ice I’d need, but would give me a good start.

Golden Boy cooperated when I stuck his leg into the ice bandage, but he wasn’t happy about it. After his first treatment, I noted the time, and called Peggy to tell her I’d be spending the night in the barn.

“I’ll sleep on the hay between horse blankets,” I said. “I’ve done it plenty of times before.”

“I have an old cot from when Ben and Marilee used to go camping together. You’re welcome to borrow it.”

“You didn’t camp?”

“Huh. My idea of roughing it is the Great Western or the Marriott. Mosquitoes find me really tasty, but they used to bite Ben and Marilee and fall off dead.”

“A cot would be great,” I said. I could set it up in the clients’ lounge close to the bathroom. “I’ll come get it and pick up some of the leftover funeral meats and buy a couple of bags of ice for my cooler.”

“The cot’s in the attic. I’ll bring it down while you fix up an ice chest and some sandwiches.”

“You sure you don’t want me to come with you?” Peggy asked an hour later as she helped me load my truck. “You’ll be all alone out there.”

“The night is clear, so I’m bound to have cell phone reception. I’ll keep my pistol with me. Nobody but you knows I’ll be there. I can’t ice Golden Boy’s leg every two hours unless I stay out there.”

“I could kill Jacob for taking off like that.”

“You and me both. That sort of thing was supposed to be his job.”

*

I was actually looking forward to spending my first night in the stable, even on a cot in an empty clients’ lounge. Hiram had mounted one dawn-to-dusk floodlight that lit the parking area and hung another that lit the walkway from one to the other from the peak of the stable, so I didn’t need the flashlight I had with me to find my way.

In the spillover from the lights, I could see the other four equines at the pasture gate watching me silently, keeping tabs on their friend. When I turned on the lights in the stable, Golden Boy stuck his head over the stall door and nickered to me softly. I filled his water bucket and gave him a flake of hay, then walked him to the wash rack. He still limped, but not badly.