Judas Burning (14 page)

The man was gone.

He rose, frantic. The vines wouldn’t turn him loose, and he clawed at them, memories of Camille’s hand touching the hideous scars fluttering in his brain.

At last Eustace broke free. The woods were empty. He ran to the river, where he’d tied off his boat. The bank was empty. Only the river lazed by, so calm on the surface and so turbulent beneath.

Chickasaw County High was a long, low building that reminded Dixon of a place where poultry was imprisoned until fat enough for market. A straggle of rose bushes, surrounded by hundreds of cigarette butts clung to life at the front door. She stepped inside and made her way down the silent hallway. The place smelled like bad plumbing, dirty gym socks, and sweat, a mix that brought back a rush of memories and a vague sense of anxiety. She didn’t have permission to be on school property and figured she couldn’t get it. But Tommy Hayes had given her the dodge for over a week, and she was determined to talk to him, especially in light of what she’d learned from Calvin and Big Jim.

She looked through the small glass window of each door as she made her way down the hallway lined with metal lockers. At the end of the hall, she found the biology class. Hayes sat on a stool as he addressed his students.

Dixon tapped lightly on the door. When she opened the door and walked into the classroom, he froze. The dark circles under his eyes, his pallor, and the trembling hands he shoved in his pockets were at odds with the freckled, open freshness of his face.

Hayes looked toward the door, panic on his face.

Dixon didn’t give him a chance to run. She closed the door and glanced around the room. “Mr. Hayes, I need to talk to you.”

Before Dixon could say anything else, the bell rang and the students rushed out. Dixon and Hayes were left facing each other.

“You had no right to come in here.” The teacher was angry. “Those kids are having a tough enough time. They’re children.”

“I’ve been trying for a week to talk with you. You have a connection to the missing girls. Angie Salter almost cost you your job.”

“I don’t want to talk to you, and I don’t have to.” Hayes walked to the open door.

“What’s going on with the school board? First they vote to fire you, and then no action is taken. It’s as if I never had a conversation with Jim Welford where he as much as said you were corrupting your students.”

Hayes turned away. He went to his desk and lifted a sheaf of paper. “I have quizzes to grade. I’d like you to leave.”

“Why didn’t they fire you? Does it have to do with Angie Salter’s disappearance?”

His chair tumbled to the floor with a loud echo as he whirled to confront her. “I don’t know. I’ve never been told I was fired. Look, I need this job. This is my first contract, and if I’m dismissed, it’s going to be hell to get on at another system, especially if there’s the taint of inappropriate behavior hanging over me. If I can complete this year, I’ll gladly pack my things and get out of this sick, God-forsaken place.”

“Tell me about Angie.” Around them the school had grown silent. The students had fled like escapees. “Tell me about her,” Dixon insisted.

He slammed his palm on his desk top. “She wanted an A. She made an F. I wouldn’t change her grade, but I told her I’d help her, you know, if she really wanted to learn. She wasn’t stupid, but she was lazy. She thought she could get anything she wanted by shaking her ass. She got really mad when she realized I meant for her to study and told me she’d fix it where I wouldn’t ever be able to bother her again. Well, she almost has.”

Dixon heard footsteps. They stopped outside the biology room and a man’s face peered in.

Hayes strode to the door. “Get out of here,” he said. “It’s the reporter.”

“I’m not leaving.” The man stepped into the room.

Dixon had never seen him, but she knew he had to be the man she’d spoken with on the phone.

He looked from Hayes to her. “My name is Craig Baggett. This is about Angie, isn’t it?” Anger tightened his mouth. “Tell her, Tommy. Tell her the truth.” When the teacher remained silent, the other man turned to Dixon. “Angie was trying to blackmail him for a good grade.”

“She seems a little young for such a ploy,” Dixon said.

Baggett snorted. “Right, she was such a baby that the same tactic worked on the principal at the middle school. That’s how she finally passed the eighth grade, or at least that’s what she said. She’d sit on the tailgate of Jimmy’s truck while she was waiting for him and brag about the guys she’d done and how she could get anything she wanted. How good she was. You can ask any of the students.” He wiped his hand across his mouth as if to rid himself of a bitter taste.

Baggett had been at Hayes’s home, and now he was defending him. She was curious about their relationship, but she was more curious about Hayes’s connection with Angie Salter. Whether Baggett knew it or not, he was talking motive for murder. “Was Angie still seeing the principal?”

The young man shook his head. “Not from the gossip. She’d met some guy with money. She had this expensive gold watch. It was a …”

“Cartier,” Hayes supplied.

“And diamond earrings,” Baggett added. “Big ones. She said they were a carat each. She had other jewelry, too. Tommy couldn’t afford that kind of stuff even if he wanted to give it to her. Which he didn’t.” He looked out the window at a gang of boys dressed in football uniforms jogging toward a practice field.

Hayes nodded. “Someone was giving her expensive gifts. When I wouldn’t give her a better grade, she said she’d settle for a boom box.” He pointed out the window. “I wasn’t in a position to give her either. Now, Craig has to go to work and so do I.”

Baggett glanced at Hayes. “You might want to check out who was beating Angie. I saw her after school last week, and she had bruises on her.”

“Who was hitting her?”

Baggett shook his head. “I don’t know. Ask her boyfriend, Jimmy Franklin.”

Hayes picked up his papers. “We’re leaving.”

“One more question. Were you at the river the day Angie disappeared?”

Hayes held her gaze. “I drove down to Biloxi and hired Johnny Grelot as my attorney.” He pulled his wallet from his back pocket, retrieved a card, and handed it to her. “Call him. He’ll verify I was there.”

J.D. sat on the edge of the Victorian sofa and held the dainty coffee cup in a hand almost twice as large as the china. Steam rose from the hot coffee.

“I was hoping Calvin would be home from the bank,” he said.

“Not for a while.” Vivian crossed her legs in the chair beside him. “You look worn out, J.D. I just wonder how you can come here considering all the times you’ve refused to help us get Camille back.”

J.D. put the untouched cup on the table. Vivian had insisted on the coffee, even though he’d declined. She was watching him now, enjoying his discomfort. “I do need to talk to Calvin about something that pertains to this family,” he said.

“Don’t tell me! You’ve finally come to your senses, and you’re going to physically remove Camille from those swamps.”

J.D. shook his head. He bitterly regretted coming to the Holbert house without calling first to make sure Calvin was home. “No, I came to talk about keeping Camille safe. Camille and the other folks in town.”

“Oh, goody!” Vivian clapped her hands. “Please tell me how you’re going to accomplish that. I guess it’s a little late for the Webster and Salter girls.”

J.D. looked out the window at the expanse of immaculate lawn and the road beyond that. There was no sign of Calvin’s car, even though it was after six o’clock in the evening.

“All sarcasm aside, Sheriff, how do you propose to keep us all safe when that maniac swamp man is on the loose and two girls are missing, probably dead? Tell me the truth, have you even questioned him? Does he have an alibi?”

“Do you honestly believe Eustace would harm those girls?” J.D. had never believed Vivian’s complaints that Eustace was dangerous, or that he practiced mind control on Camille, or that he still ran moonshine. Vivian lied to achieve the result she wanted—in this case, getting Camille away from Eustace.

“I believe it with every bone in my body,” Vivian said. She uncrossed her legs, the silk of her pantsuit making a noise like a soft zipper. “I believe it because it’s true.”

“What proof do you have?”

“Those girls are the latest. They were on the river and now they’re gone. He took them and he killed them. If anything happens to my daughter, I’m going to hold you responsible.”

Arguing with Vivian was a waste of breath. “Camille is free to leave Eustace at any time. If it’s any consolation to you, Vivian, I saw her recently and she was fine. You see her all the time when she comes to town, which is fairly regularly. Ruth Ann Johnson saw her in the beauty salon and said Camille looked better than she has in a long time. Rested.”

“Ruth Ann isn’t a reliable witness and you know it.”

J.D. shifted on the sofa and checked his watch again. It was going on six-thirty, and still no Calvin. “Would you mind calling Calvin to see if he’s coming home any time soon?”

“He won’t answer the phone at the bank or his cell phone. It’s one of his little idiosyncrasies.” She leaned forward so that the front of her suit opened, exposing the creamy expanse of her breasts. “Are you afraid to be alone with me, Sheriff?”

Tempting him was a new game for Vivian. J.D. wanted to sigh, but he didn’t. “Vivian, do you have a weapon?” She frowned. “There are knives in the kitchen—”

“A gun.”

“Is there a law against an honest citizen’s owning a gun?”

“No, but it would ease my mind if I knew it was locked up somewhere.”

She laughed. “Are you afraid I might hurt myself or someone else?”

“Both,” he said.

“Put your mind at ease,” Vivian said. “Calvin took it away from me.”

J.D. stood. “That’s all I wanted to know.”

“Calvin won’t be home for a while. Are you sure you have to run off?”

“Yes, ma’am,” J.D. said, walking to the front door. When he stepped out into the still warm evening, he felt a sense of relief. Vivian was like a large cat toying with her prey.

To Vivian, everyone was prey.

The sky above the river was fuchsia, purple, and gold. The Pascagoula River shared the sky’s fiery palette, and, as the light faded, the river turned silver and then black, merging with the dense tree line on the opposite shore.

“Eustace, honey, why are you sitting out here all by yourself?” Camille asked as she approached the boat where he sat.

His rifle was covered with a tarp, and Eustace felt a moment of guilt. Camille trusted him to do the right thing. “I was just thinking,” he said.

“Oh, I don’t like the sound of that,” Camille said with a forced laugh.

He felt her hand on his back. Her warm fingers slid around his chest, and she held him tightly.

“Camille, is something wrong?”

She shook her head against his back, but he felt her tears. He held still, waiting for the storm of her emotion to pass. She was volatile, and it might be nothing serious that was upsetting her.

“What is it, Camille?”

“Mother is such a bitch.”

Eustace felt a familiar stab of hatred. Vivian and Calvin weren’t satisfied with their twenty-three-year-long attempt to destroy Camille. They kept on and kept on, nagging and trying to force her back to a world that gave her only torment and pain. They couldn’t—or wouldn’t—see how happy she was. She’d found her freedom in the woods along the river. She’d found herself in his arms, and he would do whatever was necessary to save her. Even if it cost the lives of those two girls.

“I love you,” he said, the only words that might comfort her.

“Mother says she’s going to call the governor to have me taken away,” Camille said.

She took a deep breath and tried to gain control, but Eustace could feel the warm tears splashing against his back.

“Camille, you know I never break my word, don’t you?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I make you this one promise. No one will ever take you from these swamps unless you want to go.”

“How will you stop them?” she asked.

“Don’t you fret about that. Should you ever want to go, I’ll be the first one to help you. But if you want to stay, not the governor or the president or Jesus Christ himself will be able to take you away.”

She lay against his back, her cheek pressed to his spine. He could feel her breathing calm as she relaxed. Finally she spoke. “Eustace, will you make me another promise?”

“What’s that?”

“If they come for me, promise me that you’ll kill me before you let them have me.”

He closed his eyes. “Camille, it won’t come to that.”

“Promise me.” She rubbed against him. “Old folks sometimes make pacts where one will kill the other if they get sick. That’s all I’m asking. I’d rather be dead than go back to them.” Her fingers were kneading into his back like a baby kitten nursing its mother.

“Camille, you’re stronger than you think.”

“Those girls are gone, Eustace. The Indians called them below the river, just like the legend you told me. Remember how you said at night I could hear the Indians singing their death song as they walked beneath the water. It was like that. I saw the bubbles rising from beneath the water.”