An Unmarked Grave (18 page)

Taking a deep breath, I studied the rickety barn. "It could
be where he kept the feed or maybe where he stored grain.
I'll just have to look"

With a dubious grunt, he replied, "Okay. Just be careful"

"Don't worry. You wait outside" I grinned at him. "Tell
you what. If it looks like the thing is starting to fall, throw
your shoulder into it and give me a shout. Okay?"

He snorted. "Funny, funny."

The corral fences were down, so we just stepped over them
and waded through the weeds to the gaping door. A broken
hoe handle lay on the ground. I picked it up and banged one
end against the ground to shed its dirt and mud. I figured the
barn was probably home to every imaginable bird, bat, spider,
and reptile indigenous to this part of the state, although, cold
as it was, I didn't figure I had to worry about the latter two.

I eased through the door and into the shadows of the barn.
I jumped when the sudden flutter of wings sounded. Tiny
objects, frightened by my sudden appearance, darted through
the air. A shadowy figure dashed across the ground through
the stripes of sunlight shafting through a hole in the roof. In
spots, weeds grew rampant. The collapsed shed was covered with vines.

Pausing inside so my eyes could adjust to the darkness, I
peered around the barn, searching for a seed bin. For a few
moments, my mind wandered, thinking of all this old barn had seen over the last hundred years, of all that had taken
place within its walls: the laughter, the cursing, the jokingthe living. And now it was gone, forever. Just a hollow, empty
shell of what it had been, like Harlan.

I jerked myself back to the present. In the still-upright
shed were parked several farm implements, frozen with
rust. I recognized a cultivator, disks, chisel plows, and seed
drills. Behind them sat a rusted tractor with metal wheels. I
had no idea how old it was, only that it had been ancient
well before my time.

Near the rear of the barn, I found a door held closed by a
small hook latch and a drop bar. When I pulled it open, a
dark object shot out and with a frightened squeak disappeared into the shadows of the barn.

I peered inside. There was enough light to see that the
room had been used to store feed and seed. Empty sacks, covered with rat droppings, lay about the floor. Using the hoe
handle, I moved the bags around but found nothing except
more rat droppings, cockroaches, and, despite the cold, even
a couple of spiders. I studied the walls, looking for crevices
into which Barton might have stuffed the items, but discovered nothing.

On impulse, but with great care, I climbed the ladder to
the lofts and searched through them.

I found nothing.

After another few minutes, I gave up the search.

We headed back to Reuben. I didn't want to purchase
shovels from McDaniel at the feed store for fear word would
get back to Sheriff Perry.

Digging up graves anywhere without permission is illegal, and though I have at times on other cases stretched, bent, and
twisted the law, I've tried not to blatantly break it. Not like I
was planning to that night.

When we crossed the wooden bridge after leaving the
cemetery, I glanced in the direction of Justin's accident, but
the growth of brush and vines on the east bank shielded
the spot from view. A bell rang in the back of my mind, but
for the life of me, I had no idea why.

On impulse, I stopped and took a couple of snapshots
from the bridge in the direction of the accident, hoping that
later, when I viewed the pictures, I would remember whatever it was that was evading me at the moment.

A few miles beyond Elysian Hills, Jack grunted. "Wish I
thought to bring along a beer. Why don't you pull in at the
first place we see, and I'll pick up a case?"

It was times like this that I questioned my commitment to
AA. I wanted a beer, and I was going to have one. Maybe I
should stop fooling myself and quit AA. At least I wouldn't
be making excuses all the time.

Jack continued. "What do you think Barton found in the
grave, Tony?"

All I could do was shake my head. "No telling"

"Barton seemed to think that maybe Chester's death was
not an accident. What do you think?"

I pondered his question. I wasn't really sure what I
thought. "Hard to say. Back in Austin, I learned there was
this guy looking for Justin the same time I was, but he had
an ironclad alibi for the day of Justin's accident" I paused,
then decided to keep rambling. Believe it or not, sometimes
I even come up with some worthwhile ideas when I'm just
talking about whatever comes to mind.

"When I first came here, I was looking for a missing man.
That was all. I found him, took him back to his family, and
the next thing I know, he's dead. Killed in an accident that I
still can't-" I froze, a vivid image flashing in my mind of
the view of the accident scene from the bridge. Suddenly I
realized what had set off the clanging of bells in my head.

Slamming on the brakes, I ran onto the shoulder, made a
U-turn, and headed back to Elysian Hills.

Jack hung on for dear life. "Hey! What the-"

I ignored him, remembering Buck Ford's explaining
how he'd spotted the truck. "It was getting dark when I hit
the bridge. If I hadn't been looking, I wouldn't have seen it.
The truck was brown."

"Tony! What's wrong? Where are we going?"

Flexing my fingers on the steering wheel, I muttered, "I
think we've just stumbled neck deep into a swamp full of
alligators, Jack"

I drove across the wooden bridge, turned around, and
stopped at the end of it. I squinted into the growing dusk
at the accident scene. "You tell me, Jack. Could you see a
pickup in the creek from here?"

He grunted. "Which way do I look?"

I pointed to the oak in view above the brush lining the
bank. "There"

"I can't see a thing," he replied. "That underbrush blocks
my view of the creek" He looked around at me. "So what?"

I studied him a moment. "So, the man who found Justin's
truck said he saw it from right about here"

Jack raised an eyebrow as if to say "no way" "He must
have X-ray vision or something, then"

Shifting into gear, I headed back to the motel. I had a lot
of work ahead of me.

In Reuben, while I picked up a couple of shovels and a
pick, Jack popped into a sporting goods store and bought
himself a warm parka.

Back at the motel, I pulled out my notes.

"Aren't you hungry? I'm starving," Jack said.

Without looking at him, I replied, "Bring me a hamburger
and fries."

"That's all?"

A burger and fries was nothing more than an appetizer
for Jack. "That'll do it, thanks"

After he left, I pulled out my stack of index cards. Each
evening, I transfer information on the cards to my laptop.
A couple of years back, I stumbled onto the USB portable
drive and, pardon the metaphor, fell in love with it. I carry
a second portable drive on which I back up the first after
every use.

Needless to say, counting my note cards, my hard drive,
and the two portables, I seldom lose any work if my laptop
takes a crash dive.

But I do my primary work from the note cards. Now, if
my IQ was up there at the genius level, perhaps I could keep
everything in my head. But it isn't, and I have to find ways
to cope with a bad memory. The note cards are the solution.
With one incident per card, I can shift them around, allowing me the opportunity to look at events from different perspectives.

So, after Jack left, I started back at the beginning. My first
stop in Elysian Hills was at the sheriff's office, when Sheriff Perry failed to recognize the picture of Justin Chester or his
name, although he had recently run a criminal check at the
request of the elementary school principal, Georgiana Irwin.

My second visit began at the same place-the sheriff's
office-where I learned that Buck Ford was the one who
found the truck.

Suddenly I paused and thumbed back through the sheriff's
cards. According to him, he'd been out at his place a couple
of hours when he heard about the accident.

I looked back at the cards I'd made when I spoke with
Mabel Hooker. According to her, just after she closed up,
Buck Ford banged on her door to use the telephone. She said
she was surprised Ford had managed to contact the sheriff
at home, for Perry had passed her store only minutes earlier
and might not have had time to reach his place.

And yet he had told me he had been home a couple of
hours, treating sick cattle. Why the discrepancy in time?

I continued reading through my note cards. I paused and
nodded with satisfaction when I came across the one that
quoted Buck Ford as saying that if he hadn't been looking,
he wouldn't have seen the pickup because it was brown.

Impossible! Underbrush blocked the scene from anyone
on the bridge.

I leaned back and studied the cards. It doesn't take a genius
to spot a goat in a flock of sheep, and it didn't take a genius to
see that something was out of kilter in Elysian Hills.

y the time Jack returned, I was exhausted. Like my
Grandpere Moise always said, I had stumbled across more
loose ends than you'd find in a worm farm.

Jack handed me the bag with my burger and fries. "We
still going to the cemetery tonight?"

"Yeah" I pointed a crisp French fry at a map on my desk.
"But we're not going through Elysian Hills. I don't want to
stir up any attention. Cemetery Road connects with a small
town by the name of Rayford a few miles south. We'll come
up that way"

We pulled onto the interstate around midnight. I kept my
eye on the rearview mirror. Most of the headlights moved on
past us, but I noticed that one set exited with us at Rayford.

I grinned in relief as they continued past the corner at
which we turned, but a few minutes later, as we headed north
toward Elysian Hills, a pair of headlights fell in about half a mile behind and followed us for a few miles before turning off.

Thirty minutes later, we eased to a halt in the cemetery.
There was enough of a moon not only to see what we were
doing but also to cast fathomless shadows that caused the
hair on the back of my neck to bristle. In the distance, an
owl hooted. A second answered.

Jack jumped. "What was that?"

"Just an owl, that's all"

At that moment, a coyote yipped several times and ended
with a plaintive howl.

"That wasn't an owl!" Jack exclaimed.

"No, it wasn't. It was a ghost. Now start digging."

Jack jerked around. "What?"

"Just dig!"

A few minutes later, about four feet down, we hit the threefoot long casket, which, to my surprise, was still intact. I tied
a handkerchief over my nose. Jack followed my example.
Using the pick, I pried the lid off the wooden casket.

I've seen enough disinterred remains not to be surprised
by what is revealed when a casket is opened. I've seen fiftyyear-old remains that look as if they could get up and walk.
Others, less than ten years old, were only pale bones.

But this time, when I threw the lid back and Jack flicked
on the flashlight, I did a double take.

Jack whistled in amazement.

We stared at the interior of the coffin for several seconds.
"That sure isn't no midget's bones," Jack muttered, staring
at the skeletal remains that had been cut in half to fit into the
small casket.

"Turn off the light," I said hastily. I pulled the throwaway camera from my pocket and snapped several shots. "All
right. Let's cover this up and get back to the motel"

"Who do you suppose it was?" Jack whispered as we hurriedly shoveled the soil back into the grave.

"No idea, but that's who Harlan Barton saw being buried
that night he told us about"

"Why didn't he report it to the sheriff?"

I padded the last of the soil down. "That's a good question, Jack. A real good question. I'm awful curious about the
answer myself"