Death on the Move Read online

  DEATH ON THE MOVE

  Book Four of the Dan Rhodes Mystery Series

  Bill Crider

  First Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press

  Copyright 2013 / Bill Crider

  Texas flag image courtesy of:

  Nicolas Raymond

  LICENSE NOTES

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to the vendor of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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  Meet the Author

  BILL CRIDER is the author of more than fifty published novels and numerous short stories. He won the Anthony Award for best first mystery novel in 1987 for Too Late to Die and was nominated for the Shamus Award for best first private-eye novel for Dead on the Island. He won the Golden Duck award for “best juvenile science fiction novel” for Mike Gonzo and the UFO Terror. He and his wife, Judy, won the best short story Anthony in 2002 for their story “Chocolate Moose.” His story “Cranked” from Damn Near Dead (Busted Flush Press) was nominated for the Edgar award for best short story.

  Check out his homepage at: http:// www.billcrider.com or take a look at his peculiar blog at http://billcrider.blogspot.com

  Book List

  Novels:

  The Sheriff Dan Rhodes Mystery Series

  Too Late to Die

  Shotgun Saturday Night

  Cursed to Death

  Death on the Move

  Evil at the Root

  Booked for a Hanging

  Murder Most Fowl

  Winning Can Be Murder

  Death by Accident

  A Ghost of a Chance

  A Romantic Way to Die

  Red, White, and Blue Murder

  “The Empty Manger,” (novella in the collection entitled Murder, Mayhem, and Mistletoe.)

  A Mammoth Murder

  Murder Among the O.W.L.S.

  Of All Sad Words

  Murder in Four Parts

  Murder in the Air

  The Wild Hog Murders

  The Murder of a Beauty Shop Queen

  The Carl Burns Mystery Series

  One Dead Dean

  Dying Voices

  …A Dangerous Thing

  Dead Soldiers

  The Truman Smith Mystery Series

  Dead on the Island

  Gator Kill

  When Old Men Die

  The Prairie Chicken Kill

  Murder Takes a Break

  The Sally Good Mystery Series

  Murder Is An Art

  A Knife in the Back

  A Bond with Death

  The Stanley Waters Mystery Series (Willard Scott, Co-Author)

  Murder under Blue Skies

  Murder in the Mist

  Stand-Alone Mystery and Suspense Novels

  Blood Marks

  The Texas Capitol Murders

  Houston Homicide (with Clyde Wilson)

  House-Name Spy Fiction

  The Coyote Connection (a Nick Carter book, in collaboration with Jack Davis)

  Western Novels

  Ryan Rides Back

  Galveston Gunman

  A Time for Hanging

  Medicine Show

  Outrage at Blanco

  Texas Vigilante

  As Colby Jackson:

  Dead Man’s Revenge

  Gabby Darbins and the Slide-Rock Bolter

  Horror Novels (all published under the pseudonym “Jack MacLane”)

  Keepers of the Beast

  Goodnight, Moom

  Blood Dreams

  Rest in Peace

  Just before Dark

  Books for Young Readers

  A Vampire Named Fred

  Muttketeer

  Mike Gonzo and the Sewer Monster

  Mike Gonzo and the Almost Invisible Man

  Mike Gonzo and the UFO Terror

  Short Story Collections:

  The Nighttime is the Right Time

  CONTENTS

  DEATH ON THE MOVE

  A Preview of TOO LATE TO DIE

  A Preview of DEAD ON THE ISLAND

  A Preview of ONE DEAD DEAN

  To Pet and Eldred Stutts

  DEATH ON THE MOVE

  Chapter 1

  “You gotta come to the funeral home right now.” Clyde Ballinger’s voice on the telephone was urgent. “It’s important.”

  Sheriff Dan Rhodes knew that Ballinger wasn’t kidding. Whatever he wanted would have to be important to keep Ballinger away from his usual Saturday-morning rounds, which consisted of visiting every garage sale within a ten-mile radius of Clearview and looking for old paperback books.

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Rhodes said. “What’s the problem?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it on the phone,” Ballinger said. He had lowered his voice considerably. “It’s something to do with business.”

  Business? Rhodes thought. Had there been a murder that he didn’t know about? Ballinger’s business as a funeral director brought him into contact with nearly every dead body in Blacklin County, and he and Rhodes had formed a sort of friendship on the basis of their occasional encounters.

  Rhodes hung up and turned to Hack Jensen, the dispatcher, general flunky, and resident wit of the county jail.

  “I’m going to run over to the funeral home,” Rhodes said.

  “Might get there quicker if you’d take the car,” Jensen said, without cracking a smile.

  Jensen seemed to think that part of his job was to find jokes to make, and when he got together with Lawton, the jailer, Rhodes often found himself thinking he was trapped in some vaudeville routine. Fortunately, Lawton was back in the cellblock and Jensen was having to go it alone today. Rhodes didn’t resent their playfulness: for what the county was paying them, they deserved a little fun.

  “Good idea,” Rhodes said. “I think I’ll do that. I’ll give you a call back after I talk to Ballinger to see if anything else’s come up.”

  “You tell Clyde I said hello,” Jensen said. “But that’s all. He’s been looking at me too close lately, like he’s measurin’ me for one of those boxes of his.”

  Rhodes wasn’t sure exactly how old Jensen was, but he was far beyond retirement age. That was why the county got him so cheap. He was willing to work for next to nothing as long as they gave him a place to keep busy. He had to be well over seventy, though he didn’t look it, and Rhodes was sure that Ballinger wouldn’t be measuring him for any box for a long time.

  Rhodes went out to the car. It was a beautiful day for January, almost no clouds, the sky so blue that it seemed to go on forever. The temperature was in the middle sixties, and

  Rhodes didn’t even need a jacket. He knew that a norther could blow in any day and drop forty degrees off the thermometer in a few hours, but he was hoping that wouldn’t happen for a long time. It wasn’t much of a hope, though. January wasn’t a month in which you could count on many sixty-degree days.

  He drove on over to the funeral home in the county car. He didn’t stop in the front. He knew that if Ballinger wanted to talk to him in private, he would be in the little house behind the main building. The funeral home had once been one of the finest private homes in Clearview, and Ballin
ger had converted the old servants’ quarters to his own hideaway after he bought and renovated the place.

  Rhodes tapped on the door and Ballinger let him in. As always, Rhodes was amazed by the room. The walls were lined with shelves of paperback books by obscure authors, and Ballinger had read most of them. His special favorite, however, was Ed McBain, and he never seemed to tire of telling Rhodes about the exploits of the members of the 87th Precinct. In fact, there was a hardcover book on Ballinger’s desk. The title was Tricks, and McBain was the author. He was the only author Ballinger bought in hardback.

  Ballinger looked uncommonly glum, but he cheered up momentarily when Rhodes mentioned the book. “Yeah,” he said. “It’s pretty good. Better than the last one, that’s for sure. It’s about Halloween, and people start finding arms and legs and things in trashcans.” He paused and looked at Rhodes. “Matter of fact, it reminds me a little of what happened around here not so long ago.”

  Rhodes didn’t want to hear about it. He remembered all too well the episode to which Ballinger was referring, and it wasn’t necessarily a pleasant memory.

  “I guess you didn’t call me to talk about that, though,” Rhodes said.

  Ballinger looked around the small room as if someone might be hiding behind a book and listening to them. “No,” he said. “I didn’t call you about that.” He walked over and stood behind his desk, looking down at the McBain book.

  He seemed almost at a loss for words, a situation which rarely occurred. People often thought of funeral directors as taciturn men, gloomy and professionally suave, but Ballinger wasn’t like that at all. He was always cheerful, always ready with a joke, almost a glad-hander. Rhodes had never seen him so quiet.

  “Maybe you ought to sit down,” Ballinger finally said.

  There was an old rocking chair across from the desk, and Rhodes sat in it, moving a copy of a paperback Western titled Saddle the Storm to make room for himself. He put the book on the desk beside Tricks.

  “You want to tell me about it?” Rhodes asked.

  “Not really,” Ballinger said. “But I guess I better.”

  They sat there in silence. After what must have been at least a minute, Rhodes said, “Well?”

  Ballinger sighed. “I got the Storms over there in the other building. You know the Storms?”

  “Jack Storm?” Rhodes asked.

  “That’s him. Him and his wife, Elva. They’re sitting over there waiting on us, but I don’t know how to face them. Nothing like this has ever happened before.”

  “Like what?” Talking to Ballinger today was almost as bad as talking to Jensen and Lawton. He could never get a straight story out of them, either.

  Ballinger looked around the room again. “Theft,” he said.

  Rhodes didn’t think there was anything new about theft. “Who’s the thief?” he said.

  “I don’t know,” Ballinger said, shaking his head. “That’s the trouble. The Storms think it’s me.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Rhodes said. “What would you steal?”

  “Nothing,” Ballinger said. “But if I didn’t steal it, who did?”

  “Steal what?” Rhodes said.

  “You think Tom Skelly would steal?” Ballinger asked. Skelly was Ballinger’s partner.

  “Slow down a little bit,” Rhodes said. “I think I must be losing the thread of the story.”

  “It’s not a story,” Ballinger assured him. “It’s the truth.”

  “Okay, it’s the truth. But let’s find out what the truth is. Something’s been stolen, I got that much. But I don’t know who stole it or what it is. I’m not even sure who’s getting accused of being the thief. At first I thought it was you, but now I think it might be Tom. The guys at the 87th would have you in the back room and be getting out the rubber hoses by now.”

  “They don’t do things like that.” Ballinger looked offended. “They do good, honest police work.”

  “I’m sure they do. But then maybe they manage to get a straight story anyway.”

  Ballinger stood up, walked over to his bookshelf, and started idly running his hand over the spines of his collection. “I’m sorry, Sheriff,” he said. “It’s not that I don’t want to tell you about it. I guess I’d make a lousy writer.”

  “You don’t have to write it. Just tell me. Start at the beginning and go right on through to the end.”

  Ballinger returned to his seat. “I guess it all started when Jane Storm died.”

  “That’s Jack’s sister?” Rhodes asked.

  “Right. She died yesterday afternoon. The funeral’s supposed to be on Sunday.”

  “Supposed to be?”

  “Yeah. The Storms came in to see her this morning, see how she was laid out, see if we did a good job. You know.”

  Rhodes knew. He nodded.

  “Of course we always do a good job. Tom’s one of the best in the business. Never too much makeup, always just the right expression on the face. A real artist.”

  Rhodes didn’t say anything. He was sure Tom Skelly did good work, but it wasn’t an art that Rhodes wanted to think about. He remembered how his wife had looked, and all the art in the world couldn’t have made her look the way she really had, the way he remembered her.

  “Anyway, they came in to look at her,” Ballinger went on. “They noticed right off.”

  Now they were getting to it, Rhodes thought. “Noticed what?” he said.

  “Noticed that her ring was missing,” Ballinger said. His voice was hushed, and he looked down at the desk.

  “Her ring?”

  “It was one her mama gave her—gold band, big diamond solitaire in the middle. She never did get married, Jane didn’t, so when she was about thirty-five her mama gave her the ring. Figured she wasn’t ever going to get one any other way, I guess.”

  “Storm tell you all this?”

  “Right. After he found out it was missing, he did.”

  “And it was on her when they brought her in?”

  “Well, no,” Ballinger said. “But they brought it by later. They wanted her to be buried with it on.”

  “Do people do that much?” Rhodes said. “Bury their family in their jewelry?” He had buried his wife in her wedding ring. He remembered that.

  “All the time,” Ballinger said. “Except for the greedy ones.”

  “And the ring’s not on her now.”

  “No. And her earrings aren’t on her, either.”

  “Earrings?”

  “Gold ones, with diamonds. Came along a few years after the ring,” Ballinger said.

  “Anything else?” Rhodes wondered.

  “Her necklace,” Ballinger said. “Pearls.”

  “Pearls with diamonds?” Rhodes said.

  “We don’t question their taste,” Ballinger said. “We just do what they ask us to do.”

  “And Tom put the jewelry on her when he dressed her.”

  “That’s what he says. And I believe him. We’ve been partners for years, and we make a good living out of this place. Why would we want to steal something like that?”

  “But somebody stole it,” Rhodes said.

  “I guess so. It couldn’t just disappear.”

  “And you want me to talk to the Storms.” It wasn’t a question.

  “They’re talking about a lawsuit,” Ballinger said.

  “I guess we better walk on over there, then,” Rhodes said.

  “Thanks,” Ballinger said.

  “All part of the job,” Rhodes told him.

  Jack and Elva Storm were sitting in the Peace and Grace Room, on the back row of the metal folding chairs that sat on the thick gray carpeting. The walls were painted a peaceful bluish gray, and soft music was being piped into the room over several discreetly concealed speakers. Rhodes thought he recognized “Peace in the Valley.”

  The casket holding the mortal remains of Jane Storm sat on a dais in front of the room. It was supported from underneath, probably by sawhorses, Rhodes thought, but you couldn’t tell b
ecause whatever was holding it had been concealed by a cloth drapery.

  Jack Storm heard them enter the room and stood up, turning to meet them. He was a tall, thin man with very white hair and a red face. He was wearing a dark suit that looked as if it had been bought twenty years before but not worn very often.

  He stuck out his hand, and Rhodes shook it. “Heighdy, Sheriff,” he said.

  “Hello, Jack,” Rhodes said. “I understand there’s some trouble here.”

  Storm looked over to where his wife was sitting. She was short and plump, and she sat with her hands clasped in her lap. She was looking at the floor, or maybe she had her head bowed for prayer. Rhodes wasn’t sure which.

  “Maybe we could step outside,” Storm said. “All this has hit Elva kinda hard.”

  “Of course,” Ballinger said. He ushered them outside the room to stand in the hallway, which was covered with the same thick carpeting.

  “You have some property missing?” Rhodes said when they were outside the room. He noticed that he was whispering, which he guessed was only natural, considering the surroundings.

  “That’s right,” Storm said, looking accusingly at Ballinger. He was whispering, too, but his whisper was harsh and throaty. “My sister’s ring, her earrings, and her necklace. They was worth a lot of money, too, Sheriff. A lot of money. Sure, we was gonna bury ‘em with her, but that was sentiment. If somebody stole ‘em,”—he paused and looked at Ballinger again—”well, we’d have to sue. After you put the thief in jail, that is.”

  “I think I understand how you feel, Jack,” Rhodes said. “But I think Clyde, here, is an honest man. Something’s wrong, all right, and I’m going to find out what it is. Maybe it’s just a mistake.”

  Storm didn’t look even halfway convinced. “What kind of a place is it where there could be a mistake like that?” he said.