A Killing in the Hills (11 page)

The trailer had once been white, but the dirt flung up by the constant churn of the coal trucks had stained its aluminum sides a brownish yellow. There were red plastic flowerpots set in each corner of the porch, filled with artificial flowers. A dusty film coated each plastic petal, so that what had started out as blue and yellow and pink was now a uniform gray.

Lori smiled a please-like-me smile. She had crossed her plump arms in front of her large bosom. She wore faded Levi’s and heavy black boots. The trousers were too long; the extra material bunched across the tops of her boots in twin blue crinkles.

Lori Sheets drove a school bus for a living. That was difficult work, especially in these mountains. Keeping control of a big vehicle required power and savvy. And many times, the drivers had to perform their own emergency maintenance. Bell had expected Lori Sheets to be a beefy woman, and she was. The only aspect of her appearance that had surprised Bell was the hairdo. The frosting was done well, and the styling was expert; her hair was arranged in soft winsome scallops that added an improbable touch of delicacy to her large face. Where would Lori Sheets find the time or the money for such a high-maintenance hairstyle?

Instead of reaching out to shake Bell’s hand, Lori leaned forward and dipped her head in an odd little gesture that was half nod, half bow. She kept her arms crossed in front of her chest.

‘Mrs Elkins,’ she said, ‘we’re just so grateful you come up to see us like this. We know you didn’t have to.’

‘I wanted to make sure I had all the information I needed. Can we go inside?’

‘Oh, sure. Sure.’

The moment they walked in the front door of the trailer, Bell understood how Lori Sheets kept up her hairstyle. The living room had been tricked up to look like a miniature salon. Three kitchen chairs were arranged side by side along one wall, like seats in a waiting area. Hanging over a fourth chair was a hair dryer with a lime green, hard plastic shell. There was also, on a series of plank shelves that scaled a dark-paneled wall, a variety of plastic containers and aerosol cans that Bell recognized as sample shampoos, conditioners, sprays, and gels, the kind supplied in hotel bathrooms, and in another corner, a wooden crate filled with glossy, oversized magazines, on the covers of which emaciated young women struck poses of complicated physical geometry. The regular furniture – couch, coffee table, TV cabinet – had all been shoved into a sharp-edged conglomeration at the far end of the room to make space for the beauty equipment.

As Bell looked around, Deanna Sheets walked into the room from the kitchen. A dark gold sweatshirt hung from her high, angular shoulders; her sticklike legs were encased in a pair of black tights, and she wore her honey-colored hair in a series of fluffy, tousled layers that artfully framed her small face.

Bell reached out her hand to Deanna. ‘I know this is a really hard time for your family, but I’m here to find out a little bit more about Albie.’

The fingers that Deanna offered back to Bell were limp. Bell had to do all the work of the handshake.

‘So.’ Bell turned around, taking in the room. ‘What’s all this?’

Deanna opened her mouth to speak, but then closed it again. Her gaze drifted toward the orange shag carpet.

Lori Sheets stepped forward, patting her daughter’s petite shoulder. Lori hadn’t taken off her jacket and didn’t ask Bell to take off her sweater, either; there didn’t seem to be any heat on in the trailer, and the air was cold.

‘Deanna wants to be a stylist,’ Lori said, ‘and she needs a place to practice. So I let her set up in here. This is all hers, all the things she’s collected and put together.’

‘I see.’

The room was too small for three people plus all of the hairdressing equipment, which made Bell wonder how it had worked when Albie was here, too. Albie was a big man, a tick over six feet tall and at least 275 pounds.

‘Well,’ Bell said. ‘I just wanted to have a brief chat. I’m not going to ask you about the facts of the case, mind you. We won’t be discussing the day it all happened. That’s for the trial. I want to know about Albie.’

Lori nodded.

‘You want to sit down?’ she asked dubiously. The couch was turned sideways and crammed at the other end of the room, definitely a challenge to reach, and if they all chose to sit, they’d be bunched too close together, like helpless siblings in the back of a station wagon on a long car trip.

‘No. This won’t take long.’

Lori was visibly relieved. ‘How about some coffee, then?’

‘No, I’m fine.’ Bell had brought in her briefcase but didn’t really need it. She set it down on the carpet, perched against her left leg. ‘Lori,’ Bell said, ‘Albie never went to school, is that right? You kept him here at home?’

‘That’s right. I knew he wouldn’t fit in. Other kids’d tease him.’

‘How does he spend his time?’

‘Well, he does his chores. He gets the wood for the stove. He can sweep the floors. Dust some, too. It takes him a while sometimes, but he can do it.’

Bell looked at Deanna. ‘It must be hard for you. Having your brother here, when you bring friends home. Needing to explain about him.’

Deanna’s gaze flashed from the carpet to her mother. Then to Bell.

‘Yes, ma’am,’ Deanna said.

‘So it’s been hard?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

Deanna’s eyes disengaged again. Bell had to fight off the urge to take the young woman’s chin in her hand and force her to keep her head up.

Looking past Deanna into the kitchen, Bell saw a long particleboard shelf slotted onto aluminum brackets on the wall. It was crammed with snow globes.
Looks like at least thirty
, Bell guessed.
I’d sure hate to have dusting duty in this place
. The plastic bubbles bumped up against each other, some large, some very tiny; some were round bubbles, others were tall, skinny tubes.

Deanna raised her head and turned it, to see what had caught Bell’s eye.

‘Those’re mine,’ Deanna said. ‘Got a lot of ’em.’

Bell remembered the snow globes she’d seen in truck stops and hotel gift shops, the souvenirs from specific places; a tiny arch for St Louis, a Statue of Liberty for New York, the Alamo for Texas, all doused with white or gold flakes of confetti if you shook the thing back and forth or turned it upside down. Snow globes, Bell found herself musing as she regarded the crowded shelf, were plastic scraps signifying a larger world, the world beyond trailers and coal trucks.

And disabled brothers.

Maybe these weren’t just collectibles. Maybe they were things to hope on.

Most of the snow globes were too small for Bell to be able to make out the figures inside or the labels on the pedestals, but the identity of one of the larger globes was discernible: In big red slanting letters across its base she read
VIVA LAS VEGAS
!

‘Tell me about Albie,’ Bell said, turning back to Lori. ‘When did you first know he was different?’

‘Right away. It was the look he had. The look in his eyes. A funny look. Like he wasn’t there or nothing. And he never talked. Didn’t walk, neither, until he was five or six years old. Couldn’t figure it out.’

‘What did you do?’ Bell asked. ‘What did the doctor say?’

‘Well, thing is—’ It was Lori’s turn to look down at the carpet. ‘Thing is, we didn’t have no doctor. Albie was born right here at home. Same with Deanna. Curtis had lost his job down at the tire store – weren’t his fault, weren’t their fault, there just weren’t no business coming in – and so we did without. Had my children right here.’

Bell kept her eyes aimed at Lori’s. In her experience, the more difficult the question, the more important it was to look the other person in the eye when you asked it. It showed that you had a respect for their life, for what they’d been through. If you hesitated, if you looked away, you were doing it for yourself, not for them.

‘What happened, Lori? What made Albie different?’

‘When he was bein’ born, he didn’t get no oxygen. That’s what they told me later. Lack of oxygen is what done it. That meant his brain wasn’t right. Wasn’t nobody’s fault. Just happened that way.’ She spoke the last two sentences in a singsong way, as if they were part of a catechism. She’d probably had to tell the story over and over again, Bell figured, to various social workers.

Bell nodded. ‘Okay, Lori. Let me ask you one more thing. And Deanna’ – she turned to include the young woman who was still apparently mesmerized by the carpet fibers – ‘I’d like your input on this, too. Do you think Albie knows right from wrong? When he does something wrong, is he ashamed? Does he understand what he’s done? Does he apologize or try to make it right?’

Deanna flinched as if she’d been poked with a stick. She looked at her mother as she spoke.

‘There was that one time, Mama, ’member that?’ Deanna said, agitation making her words come in a tumbled rush. ‘’Member?’

‘Slow down, sweetie,’ Lori said, ‘so’s Mrs Elkins can understand you.’

Deanna looked at Bell. ‘Once,’ she said, ‘Albie was roughhousing with Tyler here in the living room. I told ’em to stop but they wouldn’t. They was having too much fun. Then Albie knocked over that shelf over there’ – Deanna waved in the appropriate direction – ‘and one of my good shampoo bottles flew off and landed on the floor and got ruint. Albie didn’t pay no attention. Didn’t know what he’d done. Just laughed about it. Him and Tyler.’

Deanna had spoken in what sounded like a single headlong breath. She looked at her mother. Lori, though, was watching Bell, not her daughter.

‘So Albie and Tyler Bevins,’ Bell said, ‘played here at your house, as well? In addition to Tyler’s basement?’

‘Oh, yeah,’ Deanna said. ‘Lotsa times.’

‘How did Tyler get here? I mean, he was six years old. And the Bevins house is a good mile or so away.’

Deanna looked at her mother.

‘Tyler’s daddy would drive him up,’ Lori said. ‘Usually, that’s how it was.’

Bell nodded. ‘I see.’

There was a short spell of quiet, broken by the sudden thunder of two coal trucks going by on the road outside, one right after the other. A furious grinding of gears exploded out of ancient overworked engines. The trailer quivered, shimmied.

‘That racket don’t never quit,’ Lori said, ‘even on Sunday mornings. Them coal trucks is always on the go, day or night.’

Deanna was restless. She didn’t want to talk about coal trucks. ‘You gotta understand,’ Deanna said, ‘how Albie never cared if he messed with my stuff. It didn’t bother him none. He never realized how he ruint things.’

‘All right, then,’ Bell said. ‘I thank you both very much.’ She had to be careful. She couldn’t get into the facts of Tyler’s death; that had been her agreement with their attorney. Today’s brief conversation was for background, not to dig out any additional evidence against Albie Sheets.

She picked up her briefcase. At the door of the trailer, she paused.

‘I’m sure this is a difficult and confusing time for both of you,’ Bell said. ‘I should’ve asked earlier, but do you have any questions for
me
? Any at all?’

Deanna smiled and lifted her right hand shyly, as if she were in a classroom.

‘I got a question,’ she said.

Bell waited.

‘Could I maybe do your hair sometime? No offense, ma’am, but I think I could make it look a lot better. Way it is now, if you don’t mind me saying so, you look kinda like you’re back in olden days.’

10

When she stepped off the front stoop of the Sheets trailer, Bell was relieved to see that her Explorer was intact. It hadn’t been sideswiped by a coal truck. Hadn’t rolled off the edge of the mountain. The side mirrors had survived.

She slid in behind the wheel and slung her briefcase onto the seat beside her. Backing slowly onto the road, looking anxiously and repeatedly over her right and left shoulders to check and double-check for any lurking coal trucks, she finally was able to straighten the wheels and tackle Route 6 again, heading for home.

Alone at last, and grateful for it, Bell reviewed the final few minutes of her time with Deanna and Lori Sheets. Bell had politely declined Deanna’s request to give her a makeover. But when Lori scolded her daughter –
Deanna, honey, you just don’t say such things to people, you’re hurting Mrs Elkins’ feelings, and by the way, Mrs Elkins, Deanna didn’t mean that she’d ask you to pay, it’s all free, ’cause she don’t have no license yet and by law she can’t charge for her services
– Bell had assured Lori that she wasn’t offended. Not in the least.

The answer, though, was still no. She was happy with her hairstyle just the way it was.

As Bell drove down the mountain, the trees on both sides of the road seemed to do what they’d done on her way up, which was to close in slowly over the top of her SUV, leaning in, branches intersecting. Creating a dark and solemn arch. She loved these mountains, loved their raw beauty, but it was a wary, cautious love, the kind of love you might have for a large animal with a vicious streak. You could love it all you liked, but you couldn’t ever turn your back on it. You had to respect the fact of its wildness. It was a wildness that would outlast your love.

The steep grade made the Explorer’s brakes work harder than they wanted to. Held back, the engine lapsed into a frantic, incensed grinding that made Bell think of popping neck muscles and snapping hamstrings, as the SUV tangled with one tight curve after another.

She tried to keep her mind exclusively on the road, but it was difficult. Bell was thinking about parents and kids, about how far a mother would go to protect her child. She remembered the feeling she’d had the day before, when she had barreled her way into the Salty Dawg, knowing only that there had been a shooting and that Carla was in the vicinity. She would’ve done anything to protect her child.

Same as any mother.

So what would Lori Sheets do? How far would she go? Would she lie about Albie’s mental capacities? About his understanding of what happens when you loop a hose around a small boy’s neck and tighten it? Would she try to protect him however she could? And if Albie had acted innocently, how could his actions be considered evil?

Most people thought a prosecutor’s main workplace was the courtroom. But the bulk of Bell’s labor occurred elsewhere. The meat of it had nothing to do with a judge or jury. It happened when she made decisions – decisions about whom to indict, about what to charge them with, about which crimes she should focus on and how to deploy the resources of her office – just as she was having to make in the Albie Sheets case. Those decisions always came outside the courtroom, before a trial began. Bell liked to compare it to sports. Everybody enjoyed watching the game, but for the athlete, the real moment of truth came on the practice field or in the weight room, in the long afternoons of repetition, of fatigue. By the time the game came around, the outcome was all but assured. The game was only the coda. The shadow of the main event. By the time Bell walked into a courtroom, most of the real drama was long over.