Bill Crider - Dan Rhodes 09 - Death by Accident (23 page)

A wrecking yard was the obvious place to hide a Jeep Cherokee, Rhodes thought, and he wondered if John West’s Cherokee was somewhere nearby or whether it had been flattened and hauled away.  He hoped it was there.  It would make his case against Tuffy that much stronger.

Rhodes risked a quick look around the side of the Plymouth.  He didn’t think Tuffy would shoot on impulse, not if he had only one shot left.

Rain spattered down on the narrow lane between the rows of ruined cars.  Green weeds grew thick and tall along the edges of the lane and among the cars.  There was no sign of Tuffy.

The smart thing to do, Rhodes knew, would be to go back to his car and have Hack call Ruth for back-up.  But that would mean leaving Tuffy alone and maybe giving him time to get out of the yard.  Rhodes didn’t want that to happen.

Sticking close to the car bodies, Rhodes began walking slowly down the right-hand side of the lane.  The rain ran down the collar of his jacket and drew chill lines down his back.  The weeds brushed against the bottoms of his pants and shed moisture on them.  Rhodes wondered if you could really catch pneumonia from getting wet and cold.  If you could, he was doomed.

After he had gone a few yards, he could see the rusty metal fence that bounded the wrecking yard.  The cars at the end of the row were practically touching it.  If Tuffy climbed on top of the cars, he could jump over the fence.  He might already have done it.

Or he might have moved on to another row entirely.  Rhodes really had no idea.

Something made a scraping sound just above Rhodes’s head, and Rhodes looked up.  The body of an old black Chevy sat on top of two other cars, and it moved as Rhodes watched.  Then metal screamed, and the body of the Chevy tilted over and fell toward him.

Rhodes threw himself to the side and almost managed to get out of the way.  But he didn’t quite make it.

The side of the car hit Rhodes in the back and knocked him sprawling.  Sparks flashed in front of his eyes, and he thought for just a second that he had lost his grip on the pistol.  But he hadn’t.  It was there in his hand, and he tried to roll over and meet the attack that he was sure was coming.  He didn’t want to be shot in the back.

Tuffy was still saving his last shot, however.  He was running for the fence, jumping from rain-slicked car top to car top.  Rhodes tried to sit up, but pain shot up his backbone, and he lay back down.  He raised the pistol, but he didn’t think he could hit Tuffy.

He didn’t have to.  Tuffy got almost to the fence, but then his right foot slipped out from under him.  He looked almost comical as he rose in the air and landed on his back with a loud thud that dented the car top.  The rifle slipped from his fingers and fell to the ground.  For just a moment Tuffy lay still.  Then he slid slowly off the top of the car.  When he hit the ground, the weeds hid him.

Rhodes tried again to sit up.  The pain in his back hadn’t subsided, but he was able to raise himself to a crouch.  He put down a hand and pushed upward.  His knees popped, and he thought his back might lock up on him, but it didn’t.  He straightened as much as he could and took a step.

When his foot touched the ground, an electric shock tingled upward and spread out between his shoulders.  Rhodes took another step anyway.  It didn’t hurt any more than the first one had.  It didn’t hurt any less, either.

He walked slowly toward where Tuffy had fallen, each step sending a message up Rhodes’s back.  The message said:  “Stop and sit down.”

Rhodes was too cold and wet to sit down, and besides, he had to check on Tuffy, who seemed pretty sure to be hurt worse than Rhodes was.  Just in case Tuffy was playing possum, however, Rhodes held the pistol ready.

“Tuffy?” Rhodes said when he got near the spot where West had fallen.

There was no answer.  Rain beat on the tops of the cars.  Rhodes waited, and finally the weeds shook as if someone were moving in them.

“I have you covered, Tuffy,” Rhodes said.  “And you just have one shot left.  You might as well come with me.”

“You can go to hell, Sheriff,” Tuffy said.

The tip of his rifle poked out from the weeds, and he fired his last shot.

This time, he didn’t miss.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

R
hodes felt the bullet burn him somewhere high on his shoulder.  He sat down, hard.  Water splashed around him, and his backbone twanged.

Tuffy came out of the weeds and headed for the fence.  Rhodes watched him go and tried to bring up the pistol for a shot.  For some reason, he couldn’t make his hand move.

When Tuffy reached the last stack of cars, he climbed from bumper to bumper to the top and got ready to jump the fence.

“You’ll break your neck,” Rhodes called.

Tuffy stopped and looked back.  “You could be right, Sheriff.  I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.”

He climbed back down and walked toward Rhodes.  Rhodes watched him coming through the rain.

“I don’t have to jump any fence,” Tuffy said.  “And I don’t have to run.  I can just drive the wrecker.  Or your car.  You’ll give me the keys, right?”

“I don’t think so.  I’ll give you a ride to the jail, though.”

Tuffy stopped in front of Rhodes and laughed.  He wiped the rain out of his face.

“I don’t think you’re going to take me anywhere, Sheriff,” he said.  “You would’ve shot me by now if you could, so when you give me your keys, you might as well give me the pistol, too.”

Tuffy bent down to take the pistol from Rhodes’s right hand.  Rhodes waited until the Tuffy’s fingers touched the gun, and then he hit him, bringing his left fist up from the ground with all the strength he had left.

He caught Tuffy right on the point of the chin.  Tuffy’s teeth clicked together and his head snapped back.  Rhodes hit him again before he could fall, catching him on the side of the head this time.  There was a loud
pop
, which Rhodes knew was probably his knuckle, though he hoped it was Tuffy’s skull, and Tuffy collapsed across Rhodes’s lap.

Rhodes let him lie there for a second, then pushed him off.  He took the pistol in his left hand and prodded Tuffy hard in the ribs.  Tuffy didn’t move, but Rhodes felt like hitting him again anyway, maybe in the head, just for fun, but with the pistol this time.  He didn’t, though, because there was no use in blaming Tuffy for Rhodes’s own stupidity.  He should have known Tuffy would shoot.  It was either that or give up.  Rhodes had thought Tuffy would give up, but he’d misjudged him.

Rhodes twisted his neck and tried to see where he’d been shot.  He couldn’t see the spot, but he didn’t think he was hurt badly.  He was bleeding, but not much, and he figured the bullet had just creased him.  It had taken a little chunk of muscle, however, and Rhodes’s shoulder felt as if a Boy Scout had built a fire in it.

After a while Rhodes stood up.  It was harder to do than it had been the last time he’d done it, and he swayed for a second after he got to his feet, but he didn’t fall back down.

Tuffy was still lying where Rhodes had shoved him, his mouth almost in a puddle that the raindrops dimpled as they fell.  Rhodes toed Tuffy’s head a little to one side.  Tuffy was going to have to lie there until Rhodes could get help, and Rhodes wouldn’t want him to drown.

Working mostly with his left hand, which was beginning to swell, Rhodes got Tuffy’s hands together behind his back and cuffed them.  Tuffy would still be able to walk if he came to, but he wouldn’t be driving anywhere or climbing any fences.

Rhodes started back to his car.  When he was halfway down the lane, he heard Tuffy calling him.

“You can’t leave me here,” Tuffy yelled.  “I’ll get pneumonia”

“Welcome to the club,” Rhodes said, and sneezed.

“I’
ve never been shot before,” Rhodes told Ivy.

“That’s pretty lame,” she said.  “I hope you don’t think that excuses you.”

They were sitting on the sofa, watching Doris Day and Rod Taylor in
The Glass Bottom Boat
.  Rhodes thought Taylor was all right, but he was no Rock Hudson.  Of course it could be that Rhodes’s judgment was clouded by the time-released antihistamine he was taking for his runny nose.

“I didn’t mean to get shot,” Rhodes said.

“You didn’t mean to get shot?  That’s even worse than saying you’ve never been shot before.  And what about your face?  Not to mention your hand.”

She touched his swollen hand gently, but it was clear that she was still upset.  Rhodes didn’t really blame her.  He shouldn’t have gone to Tuffy’s place alone, even if his suspicions hadn’t completely hardened, and he’d underestimated Tuffy’s ruthlessness.

“Would it help if I said I’m sorry?”

“Maybe.”

“I’m sorry.”

“That’s better.  Now say you won’t do it again.”

“I won’t do it again.”

“All right.  I’ll take your word for it.  This time.  But you’d better not mess up again, bub.”

“Bub?”

“You heard me.”

A commercial for a finance company came on, and Ivy reached for the remote to mute the TV.

“You never did say whether Kara West knew what was going on,” she said.

Rhodes leaned back on the sofa.  “Tuffy says everything was his idea, and I more or less believe him.  He fell for Kara, and he thought he could get John out of the way by lying about him.  He told Mrs. West that John was going out with other women, but it was just Tuffy he was out with.”

“And because Kara trusted her husband, that didn’t work,” Ivy said, as if she weren’t sure that trusting a husband was a wise move.

“It didn’t work,” Rhodes said.  “Not soon enough to suit Tuffy, anyway.  It might have worked, eventually, but Tuffy got in a hurry.  Maybe the insurance money had something to do with it, too.  John had a good policy, and Tuffy must have thought he could get Mrs. West and the money, too.  All he had to do was kill his brother.”

“Brotherly rivalry,” Ivy said.  “An old story.”

“Practically the oldest,” Rhodes agreed.  “Anyway, he got John drunk, took him out on that road, and told him they were out of gas.  John was supposed to walk to town and get some while Tuffy stayed with the car.”

“And Tuffy ran over him.”

“Well, he didn’t run over him.  He just hit him.”

“Same thing.”

“I guess so,” Rhodes said.  “Pep found out about it because he knew John and Tuffy were together that night and got suspicious.  He slipped into the wrecking yard and found West’s Cherokee.  I thought maybe Tuffy had asked him to repair it, but Tuffy wasn’t quite that stupid.”

“He wasn’t stupid at all.  He managed to kill Pep and Randall Overton, didn’t he?”

Rhodes nodded.

“But why?” Ivy asked.

“Tuffy says that they were trying to blackmail him.  Pep must have told Overton that Tuffy had killed his brother, and the two of them cooked up a scheme to make a little money out of it.  That’s just the kind of guys they were.  They threatened to tell me the story, but I’m sure they didn’t care about seeing Tuffy get what he deserved.  They thought it was just another scam, another way to make a few easy dollars.  But they misjudged Tuffy.”  He paused and looked at Ivy.  “Like I did.”

“You certainly did,” Ivy said.  “But you won’t do it again.  You promised.”

“That’s right.”  Rhodes reached for the remote.  “Show’s coming back on.”

Before Rhodes could punch the mute button, Ivy grabbed the remote from him and set it on the coffee table.

She said, “He made all three deaths look like accidents.  Not just anybody would have seen the connection.”

“Maybe not,” Rhodes said.  “But there just aren’t that many accidents around here.  Not fatal ones.”

“Don’t try to make light of it.  You’re the one who saw what was going on when no one else did.  How’d he kill them, anyway?”

“He got them drunk.  It worked on John, and it worked on both of them.  Get a man drunk, and you can talk him into a lot of things.  Going for a swim, for one.  Sitting in the car for a smoke, for another.  And then you just take advantage of the situation.”

“So they were the stupid ones, not Tuffy.”

“Looks that way,” Rhodes said.

“What about the Edsel?” Ivy asked.

“We’ll just have to hope somebody takes over the wrecking yard.  Or we can go somewhere else and try to get parts.  Bull Lowery can do the body work, though.”

Yancey came bouncing into the room, barking.

“He sure has a lot of energy for such a little dog,” Rhodes said.

“He’s hungry, and someone should take him for a walk,” Ivy told him.

Rhodes reached to the bandage that wrapped his shoulder and moaned loudly.

“I’d do it,” he said, “but I’ve been shot.”

“I’ll do it then,” Ivy said.  “Does your arm really hurt under that bandage?”

“Yes. It itches, too.”

“Good,” Ivy said.  She punched the mute button, and the sound came back on.

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Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four