Death in Reel Time (29 page)

I looked through my notes from the last interview with Charlie and jotted down questions for the afternoon session today, some of them subtly contrived to help me prove my theory about Charlie's actual age and identity.

When Tony arrived we went over the questions, adjusted some, and added a couple of new ones. On the drive to Charlie's place Tony seemed fidgety. “Are you nervous about this or something?” I asked. “Afraid I'll scare him off?”

“No, we're ready,” he said. “And you're fine. It's something else. I feel like I ought to tell you about it, but I don't know why I should feel that way. I mean it's not like I owe you what's in my head.”

“You don't owe me anything, Tony,” I said. “But if there's something you want to talk about, I'm a pretty good listener and I know how to keep my lip zipped.”

“I know, else Beth wouldn't have told you about getting
used as a punching bag by her creep of a husband,” he said, spitting each word.

“She told you?” I asked.

“No, I overheard her talking to Olivia and Daniel. They don't realize how much sound travels through the heat ducts in that house. I wasn't eavesdropping; you just hear whether you want to or not,” he said.

“Did you suspect what was going on?” I asked. “Is that why you didn't like Blaine?”

“I didn't know-know, if you get my drift, but something about him wasn't right. He had this look in his eyes sometimes. It was stone cold with an afterburner of psycho. Foster kids got good radar about that look.”

“You know Beth doesn't want anyone to know about this, right? I think she'd be very distressed if it got out.”

“I don't get why,” Tony said. “She didn't do anything wrong. But it's her business and she should get to say what she wants. So I won't say anything to anybody but you. I just didn't like holding it in, you know? And I overheard Beth say she'd told you and Esme about it because she knew she could trust you. It made me feel bad she couldn't trust me, too, but I don't blame her.”

“Don't look at it that way, Tony,” I said. “Knowing is a burden, really. You just said so yourself. She probably wanted to spare you that.”

“Yeah, maybe. Anyhow, I don't want any of them to start acting different around me, or be mad at me for overhearing. So don't say anything.”

I pinched my thumb and finger together and drew them across my lips.

*  *  *

Charlie wasn't at his place when we arrived and we had no way to reach him since he didn't have a phone. The only way Tony had been able to contact him was to come over or search for him around town, which was how he'd found him this morning.

“He's probably still over at the Methodist church,” Tony said. “The pastor's wife hired him to construct some new beds and put in bulbs—tulips and some other flowers I can't remember the names of—along the walkway that leads from the parking lot to the church. She's hoping they'll bloom at Easter time.”

Esme could probably recite the names of all the flowers for him,
I thought. She'd still been suffering under a barrage of blossoms this morning, though she had a feeling things were building toward something more comprehensible. She'd been in the midst of cooking a big dinner when I left with enough banging and clanging to rival Olivia's big wind contraptions. That's the way Esme works out her issues with her
guests.
Sometimes, when she's feeling kindly disposed, she refers to them as PALS, which is her acronym for Previously Alive and Longing for Solace. When she's feeling neutral they're guests and when she's ticked off they're parasites. As much as Esme had come to admire Celestine, after last night she'd slipped from PALS status to guest and was teetering there.

“Should we wait for Charlie or come back later?” I asked.

“I'd say wait unless you've got something better to do,” Tony said. “I don't want to give him any excuse to put us off.”

I realized only then that I was the one who was nervous. I had no idea why. Yes, Charlie Martin, aka whoever, was an
irascible old cuss, but I'd surely seen a lot worse. And I was confident that with enough patience, he could be brought around.

Just then Charlie rounded the corner of the building on his bike. He was pulling his cart full of tools behind him. The sight made me reassess my theory. Today he looked every year the age he claimed.

He nodded a curt greeting as he unlocked his door and huffed as he started to take his tools from the cart and put them inside. “People will steal the fillings out of your teeth around here,” he grumbled.

Tony and I each grabbed what we could carry. I noticed there were two short shovels. One matched the quality tools at Beth's house and one was a lower grade and still had a sticker on it. So I guessed Beth would be getting hers back soon. When the cart was empty Charlie came back out and cobwebbed what appeared to be a logging chain around his bike and cart and secured it with an old-fashioned padlock the size of a softball.

He left the door standing open and Tony and I looked at one another and shrugged, figuring that must be our invitation. We followed him into a narrow vestibule, where Charlie stopped to hang up his jacket.

He slumped into a chair and motioned vaguely toward a threadbare sofa. I noted again how tidy the place was. The furnishings were spare, cheap and old, but everything was clean and orderly.

“How's Beth?” Charlie asked as we sat down. It was the first spark of interest he'd shown and I debated what to tell him.

“Is she okay?” he pressed. “I mean, I know she's not okay just yet, but will she be once this part's over?”

“I'm sure she will be,” I said, though I wasn't clear on what
this part
was. “I expect she'll come around to see you soon. She just needs some time.”

Charlie nodded, then dealt with a coughing spasm. “That's good then,” he said when he'd gotten his breath back. He glanced around toward the kitchen, then tapped his hands on the arms of his chair. “You know, I think this is enough of this foolishness. I'm tired and hungry and nobody cares what an old man has to say about anything anyhow. Let's call this off.”

Tony slumped, but I wasn't ready to throw in the towel. “You know, I'm hungry, too,” I said. “Maybe Tony can go pick us up some lunch. What do you like?”

I wasn't remotely hungry, having had a big fat calzone and two tall glasses of tea just before I came over, but I tried to sell it, giving Tony's arm a little slap. “This guy's so into his filming he forgets a woman's got to eat!”

Charlie considered for a long moment. “Well,” he said finally, “I like the pizza from that place over on River Road. Y'all like that?”

“I love it,” Tony said, and was instantly on his feet. I handed him my keys and after he took our topping orders he was out the door.

I didn't want to ask Charlie any questions that Tony would want to capture on camera, so I mustered all the charm I could and tried some light banter.

Charlie was immune.

Fine. I wasn't really in a mood for small talk, either. What I really wanted to ask him about was his buddy Hershel
Tillett and how he, much too coincidentally, happened to share the same name as Hershel's deceased stepbrother. But he was already cranky enough. I figured if I brought up any of that and he realized I'd been snooping around in his background he'd throw us out for sure—and for good. I struggled on for another ten minutes or so, asking him about the various jobs he was doing around town. He was mending a screen door at Miss Etheleen Morganton's, repairing a fence for Ingrid Garrison, and helping out with building a meditation labyrinth at St. Raphael's.

I latched on to the last job and asked a bunch of questions. I was genuinely interested since St. Raph's is my parish. And, lax Catholic though I am, I loved the idea of the labyrinth and had even made a modest contribution. We talked easily for a while but when we'd exhausted that subject the awkwardness returned.

He got up from his chair with some difficulty. “ 'Scuse me,” he said. “I'm gonna go wash up. Make yourself to home.”

The small space was getting to me. I headed for the front doorway to get a breath of air. I bumped Charlie's jacket as I went by and it nearly fell from the hook. I reached up to catch it. It was heavy and lopsided and I saw why. There was a gun that looked as old as Charlie in one of the pockets. So much for Denny's warnings. I'd definitely be informing on Charlie on that one. I opened the door and took in a few gulps of air, then returned to my place on the sofa. I pulled my phone from my bag and started to check messages and email. What did people ever do with snatches of downtime before smartphones came along?

I was excited to see a message from Lacey Simmons. I tapped it open and skimmed through her apologies about not getting back to me, then came to the meat of the message. She had a total of twenty-seven photographs of Hershel posing with gangs of friends, but she'd only attached scans of the five that had names written on the backs and the boot camp one that had no names. I clicked to bring up the first one and read the names, none of which sounded familiar. I dutifully pulled out my notebook and scratched them down. I spread my fingers on the screen to enlarge each of the four faces and studied each carefully, making a star by the names of the two who looked baby-faced. I went through the other photos in a similar fashion. When I got to the final one fireworks started going off in my brain and the planet seemed to tilt.

Charlie came out of the bathroom, his thin hair wet and slicked back over his balding pate. He pulled his watch from his pocket and swung it by its fob, twirling it in a loop into the palm of his hand. The whole business seemed to happen in super-slow motion. He hit the latch button just as it reached his hand, studied the face for a long moment, then latched it and put it back in his pocket. Only then did he look in my direction.

The turmoil in my head must have been visible and as our eyes met he went ghostly pale.

“Hello, Johnny Hargett,” I said. “Where've you been all these years?”

His eyes widened and he glanced toward his coat. Only then did it occur to me that maybe I'd just made a very large mistake.

Just then Tony came through the door. “Hope everybody's hungry,” he said cheerfully, lofting the pizza boxes. He looked from me to Charlie, then back to me again. “What's going on? Please don't tell me the interview's off.”

“Depends on who it is you wanted to interview,” I said.

“I
RECKON YOU
'
RE GONNA RUN
right over and tell Olivia and the kids about this,” the erstwhile Charlie said, his voice at once relieved and resentful.

“I'm not sure what I'll do,” I said. “But sooner or later they're going to know. Don't you think it would be better all around if it came from you?”

“Tell who what?” Tony said, still holding the pizza boxes. “Could somebody please tell
me
what's going on?”

I held up a hand to quiet him. “Just give us a minute, Tony,” I said, still focused on Charlie/Johnny.

He continued to stare at the scarred linoleum floor, then shook his head emphatically. “I can't do it. I know what you're saying is true; they'll find out sooner or later,” he said, his voice little more than a warble. “And I would like them to know my side of it, but I can't face them. I can't look any of them in the eye. I can't do it.”

“Tony,” I said, keeping my voice level. “Go get your camera.”

He started to protest, but I gave him a sharp look and he set the pizza boxes down and scurried out.

My cell phone, still in my hand, rang and I saw that it was Esme. I let it go to voice mail.

“You can tell your story to the camera,” I said to Johnny, trying for a sympathetic tone, though I wasn't sure I felt much sympathy for him. “That'll make it easier. We'll show the footage to Olivia, Daniel, and Beth, then they can decide whether they want to see you. I suspect they will because I'm sure they'll have questions. I know I sure do.” I hardened my tone. “Either we do it that way, or yeah, I'll head over there now and tell them myself.”

Again my cell phone rang, the insistent ring filling the small room. It was Esme again. She knew we were doing this interview, so for her to interrupt—twice—it had to be important. When I answered she blurted out. “She didn't mean it wasn't right morally,” she said. “She meant it was inaccurate. She meant it really didn't happen the way they thought for all those years. She meant what she
wrote
wasn't right. Sophreena, I'm not sure Johnny Hargett died when he went off that railroad trestle.”

“He didn't,” I said.

“How do you know?” she asked.

“Because I'm looking right at him.”

I was ridiculously gratified that, for once, I'd been the one to set Esme's world off-kilter. I promised a sputtering Esme details to follow and clicked off as Tony came back in with his camera already set up on a tripod. He had it ready to go in seconds.

Johnny sat back down, reluctantly. “How'd you figure it out?”

I told him about Celestine's diaries and what she'd written about his supposed death. He shook his head slowly from side to side, his shoulders shaking as he began to sob.

“It must have eaten Riley alive,” he said, once he'd gotten hold of himself. “I'd planned to go back. I knew he probably thought the fall had killed me. And it nearly did. But then as time passed I thought this way was better.”

Tony and I both sat silent, letting him find his way. Johnny confirmed Celestine's assessment of him as a young husband. “I wasn't a man to go through tough times with back then. Fact, for Renny especially, I was the one that made times tough, real tough. I knew full well I didn't deserve her when I married her. There's not a day that's gone by in the last sixty years I didn't wish I could go back and fix things and make it all right. That night Riley told me I had to leave before I hurt her bad. I didn't want to hear that, him telling me how to be with my wife.”