The Cantaloupe Thief (30 page)

“I want to show you something,” he whispered, beckoning Davison and her to the closest stall. “Miss Moselle had a calf last night.”

He grabbed Davison by the waist and held him aloft so he could see through the slats.

“A baby cow!” Davison shouted. “Brani, look! It's a baby cow!”

She wanted to share Davison's delight, but was too anxious. Rita and Max were coming, and they didn't belong on the farm. They didn't belong in their lives.

Pa pulled a baby bottle from inside his shirt. “Unfortunately,” he said, “Mosie's having trouble feeding her calf. We need to help her.”

He stepped inside the stall and upended the bottle into the calf's eager mouth. She greedily sucked down the milk.

Pa tossed the bottle to one side and went to check on the calf's mother. He and Davison seemed unaware of Rita and Max. It was up to her to protect them. Her eyes darted to the barn door, where the two suddenly appeared, outlined against a shaft of dying sunlight.

“Help him!” screeched Rita drunkenly. And then she saw Max's face, and the steak knife protruding from his forehead. Spurting blood, he pitched forward.

She tried to scream, tried to warn Pa about the intruders. But nothing came from her throat.

She grabbed the baby bottle, thinking she'd throw it to grab Pa's attention.

“God loves you,” read the blue and white label on its side. “And so does Jericho Road.”

 

Branigan jerked awake, heart hammering, choked screams in her throat. Cleo placed her head on the mattress, whining softly.

At first it had been so nice to see Pa again, and Davison, before the currents of adulthood pulled him under. But then the guilt flooded in over Rita and Max.

Who were these homeless people to encroach upon her life? And why had she invited them in?

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

Malachi sat alone in the Jericho Road dining room, his eggs, toast and bacon eaten but untasted. He'd wanted to return to where he'd first seen Vesuvius's moonscape, and if possible to ask Pastor Liam about its purchase.

He sipped his coffee, liberally sweetened. And he thought.

He had arrived in Grambling on a Greyhound bus a little more than ten years ago. He remembered the story of the downtown lady who got stabbed that July 5. How could he not? It was in the newspaper every day for three months.

He had stayed two nights right about where he sat now, he recalled, glancing around him. It'd been an abandoned grocery store then, a real mess, with dog and human excrement in one corner. Two nights had been enough, and he'd fled to the outdoors.

Malachi tried to remember the three men who'd been staying in the vacant building at the time. People came and went so freely out here. “Homelessness is fluid,” he'd heard Pastor Liam say, and it was true. From motel room to boarding house to a cousin's home to a friend's couch to a car to a tent in the woods to a shelter to a blanket under the bridge. When there was no movement toward getting clean or permanently employed, the cycle of living arrangements was endless.

So, the men in the grocery store. Were they still in Grambling? Did they see who ditched the old lady's Thunderbird in the parking lot?

It was inconceivable that someone didn't know something.
Lot of double negatives there,
he chuckled to himself. Okay, someone knew something. He agreed with the police on little, but he thought they were right about that maxim: someone always knew something. About the old lady's murder, about V, about Rita, about Max.

He needed to know who they were and what they knew.

Malachi had been startled yesterday when Demetrius spun around and called him an invisible man.
Out of the mouths of the insane...

Then Miz Branigan leaped in with what nearly amounted to an accusation: that the second dweller in Mrs Resnick's pool house was black and homeless. “Like you,” she'd said.

That's why it was so unexpected to find himself caring — worrying even — that something might happen to the newspaper lady. She tried to be all tough and professional, but he'd seen her throwing up after they found Max's body. He'd seen the guilt racking her. He knew something about guilt.

Malachi stretched his legs, settled his cap more firmly over his braids. He'd lived in Grambling's shadows long enough to know about its underside; to know how the rich and poor, the sophisticated and the raw, the proper and the dangerous, merged after dark.

Rita, for instance, had once had some pretty well-to-do clients. Not recently. But once.

And he knew things about some of Grambling's
la-de-da
families. The executive who picked up male prostitutes. The high school cheerleader who scored crack. The community theater director who was convinced his creativity depended on cocaine.

When no one saw you, they had nothing to hide.

He knew some things, too, about the Resnicks. He knew, for instance, that Ramsey had a soft spot for the homeless. His name appeared frequently on Pastor's Liam's newsletter donor list. He taught a class on budgeting here at the shelter. He prayed with people who came for groceries. He quietly gave feminine products and toiletry items to Rita. And Malachi knew for a fact he had given Rita a bottle of cheap vodka from time to time.

And then there was Heath, nastier on the surface than his brother. Those Westside mill condos he'd bought had gone bust. Some street people, including Max Brody, had broken in afterward and stayed there. Sure, they had no running water or electricity. But the units were dry and relatively warm.

Malachi saw Pastor Liam walk through the sliding doors and head for the coffee urn, speaking briefly to the shelter residents serving breakfast. The man seldom took time to eat in the morning. Malachi stood and followed him to his office; he knocked, despite the artsy, hand-crafted sign that read “Come on in”.

“Come on in!” Pastor Liam's voice echoed his sign. “G'morning, Malachi. I hope you slept better than I did.”

“I imagine so.”

“What's on your mind?”

“V,” Malachi said, taking a rocking chair as Pastor Liam came around his desk to do the same. “I wanted to ask you 'bout a pitcher he did of a pond in the moonlight. You 'member that one?”

“I sure do. It was beautiful. I used it during worship with a sermon on John's prologue. Darkness and light and all that.”

“Well, V sold that pitcher to another homeless dude. He told me you said he could take it off the dining room wall. Do you know who he sold it to?”

Pastor Liam thought for a moment. “No, I don't. There wasn't anyone with him when we talked. Vesuvius said someone offered to buy it, so I told him to take it. Why?”

“You don't think it's funny that a homeless dude bought his pitcher?”

“I didn't know a homeless dude
did
buy it. I assumed he was commissioning it to one of the downtown galleries.”

“He told me it was a homeless dude, and he got at least $130 for it,” said Malachi.

“Wow.” Pastor Liam frowned. “And you think that's tied to what's been happening?”

“Aw, I don't know what I think. They's just a lot of unexplained money and a lot of unexplained homeless dudes turnin' up dead.”

Pastor Liam couldn't help smiling at Malachi's turn of phrase.

“One more thing, Pastor. Did you find out how much money was in your lock box?”

“Yeah, I talked to our office manager this morning: $650 in cash.”

A small fortune,
Malachi thought.
Enough to buy a painting, bottles of liquor, maybe even crack rocks.
But apparently not enough to buy silence.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

After a quick cup of coffee with her parents, Branigan hustled Cleo into the Civic and drove to the farm. At the last minute, she decided to get in a brief run; the wisps of last night's dream lingered and she wanted it out of her head.

She changed into shorts and running shoes, and she and Cleo set off. The morning was deliciously cool, calling to mind a poem she'd memorized in fifth grade.

And what is so rare as a day in June
Then, if ever, come perfect days.

James Russell Lowell was a New Englander, but he could have summered happily on a Georgia farm. She longed for that fifth-grade Branigan who knew nothing of guilt.

Branigan's Uncle Bobby had already let his cows out to join another fifty head; they watched with mild interest as she and Cleo circled their pasture. Her lungs filled with clean air. This was home, and she wondered how she'd been scared of it the night before.

A half-hour later, sides heaving, she walked toward the barn. Cleo began barking and charged inside. Branigan hesitated until she heard the dog's bark switch to an excited whine. A familiar voice called, “Branigan? That you?”

“Uncle Bobby!” He held open his arms and she stepped in, warning, “I'm sweaty.”

Her mom's younger brother was solidly built, his gray hair in a brush cut, his jeans and work shirt and lace-up boots identical to what Pa had worn every day. He had his own 200 acres adjoining Pa's land on one side, and the two had always shared their lakes and pastures.

“Your mama called this morning and told me about your visitor,” he said. “I wanted to take a look around.”

She peered into the last stall, where the water bottle remained where she'd found it. “See that?” She pointed. “It's a water bottle that Liam Delaney gives out to the homeless at Jericho Road. But I can't imagine one of them coming this far out. Can you?”

Uncle Bobby looked as if he wanted to say something, but stopped.

“What?” she asked.

“What about your brother?”

“Davison's in rehab at the Grambling Rescue Mission. He was here all last week, but in the house, of course.”

“Could he have left the bottle then?”

A light dawned as she realized that, until yesterday, she hadn't been inside the barn for weeks. “You know, he could have! I'm sure he was walking around while I was at work.” She breathed a long sigh. “You have no idea what a relief that is. My imagination was running wild.”

She thought for a minute. “But what about you?” she asked. “You use this barn a lot, don't you? Had you noticed the bottle?”

“No, but that doesn't mean anything,” he said. “I haven't used that stall since winter, so I really haven't been paying attention. Anyway, your mama and I still want to install an alarm. You and Cleo are kind of isolated out here by yourselves.”

“I do appreciate it. But you've already helped more than you know.”

They chatted for another minute, then Branigan headed to the house to shower, dress and get to Resnick Drugs.

 

The roped bells clanged as she walked in. A clerk and a pharmacist were working in the store and pointed her to Ramsey's closed office. She knocked. Ramsey opened it, and she was gratified to see Amanda and Heath seated inside. Ramsey wore his usual suit and looked puzzled as he took his place behind his desk. Amanda wore a gaily printed sundress and matching red sandals, but her body language was anything but casual. Her spine was ramrod straight, and her legs were pressed tightly together. Heath wore khakis and a golf shirt; it occurred to Branigan she'd never seen him in anything else.

“What's this about, Branigan?” Ramsey asked.

“Mr Resnick, Mrs Brissey, Mr Resnick,” she said formally, “we've moved the anniversary story of your mother's death up to this Sunday. A lot has been happening.”

“Can you tell us?” Amanda asked.

“Did you see the story Tuesday about the homeless woman killed on your mother's street?”

Heath's lip curled, but he remained silent.

“Yes,” Ramsey answered. “I was acquainted with Rita. I tried to help her from time to time. I believe you saw her in here one day.”

“Did you know she was at the Fourth of July party the night before your mother was killed?”

“What?”

“That's impossible!”

“No way!”

All three wore looks of shock and disbelief. If they were acting, they were skilled at it.

“Apparently,” Branigan said, “she was the daughter of friends of your family. Rita Mae Jones.”

She watched the confusion pass over Ramsey's face.

“Rita Mae Jones? Arthur and Peggy's daughter? That wasn't the Rita who was homeless.”

“Think about the things that don't change,” Branigan said. “Height. Skin color. She'd been hard into crack and crystal meth for years. Lost her teeth. The sun bleached her hair, aged her skin. That changes a person's looks drastically.”

Ramsey was still shaking his head, trying to reconcile the homeless addict he'd helped with a young woman he'd known years earlier.

Finally, he said, “Rita Mae would be in her forties. I thought Rita was sixty or more.”

Branigan nodded. “Liam assures me that crack and meth do that.”

Heath and Amanda were looking lost.

“Wait a minute, Ramsey,” said his sister. “You knew the homeless woman who was killed? How?”

“I volunteer at Jericho Road,” he said. “I helped her with toiletries, things like that. I just never dreamed I knew her from before.”

“And she never said anything about knowing you or being at your mother's house?” Branigan asked.

“Never,” Ramsey said.

Heath spoke for the first time. “Do Arthur and Peggy Jones know all this? Did they know she was homeless?”

“They came in from Atlanta to identify the body,” Branigan told him. “Whether they knew she was homeless before, I have no idea. Our cop reporter, Jody, is handling that part of the story.”

“I'm speechless,” Ramsey said, glancing at his brother and sister. “But what does this have to do with your story on Mother?”