The Prairie Chicken Kill Read online

  I had to laugh at that. The two of us were about as dangerous as a pair of bunny rabbits.

  It didn't take long to locate the pistols. I seemed to be loosening up a little, and I wasn't quite as sore as I had been. Moving around helped. I wished I had a couple of Ibuprofen. Or more than a couple. I promised myself that I'd buy a bottle when I got the dry clothes.

  "Guns'll need a good cleanin'," Red said when I got back in the cab and laid them on the seat. "I'll have to do that this evenin'." He paused. "What are we gonna do when we get back?"

  "Talk to Peavy," I said.

  I felt a lot better wearing a clean sweatshirt and jeans. The woman at the check-out counter at Wal-Mart hadn't even blinked at my muddy jeans and sweatshirt. Maybe she saw guys dressed that way all the time.

  The Ibuprofen improved my outlook, too. I didn't even mind when Red complained that the pants and shirt I'd bought for him didn't fit right. He had to admit that at least they were dry and clean. He was still concerned about me, though.

  "You sure you don't need to go by the Emergency Room?" he asked.

  "I'll be all right," I said.

  I hoped I was telling the truth. The Ibuprofen was working, but my head still felt as if someone had blown up a balloon inside it, my lips were puffy, and my jaw still felt funny. I wasn't sure my teeth were meeting in the right place when I closed my mouth.

  On the other hand, I could see and I could drive. I could hold my head up and I could breathe. I didn't see any reason to complain, not considering what Gar could have done to me if he'd had a little more time.

  Maybe Gar and I could meet again someday. I hoped that if we did, I was much better armed. I'd been right about him from the first. A .38 wasn't big enough. Maybe a rocket-propelled grenade launcher wouldn't be enough. I began thinking along the lines of a Sidewinder missile.

  "You think Peavy'll do anything about that airplane?" Red asked, breaking into my thoughts.

  "He'll have to," I said. "But it doesn't prove anything by itself. You and I are convinced that Gar used it to strafe us yesterday, but the fact that the plane's on Evans' property isn't evidence of that. We can't even prove that Evans knew it was there."

  "That son of a bitch killed my boy."

  I didn't know whether he meant Gar or Evans. Right then it didn't seem to make much difference.

  "Evans sent Gar up here to move that plane," Red went on. "He must've known we were comin' to look."

  I'd wondered about that. I didn't recall telling anyone where we were going. Red claimed that he hadn't, either.

  "But there were folks at Paul's house that might have heard me say something," he added.

  "They weren't Evans' friends," I pointed out.

  "You can't ever tell about that. Lots of folks listen to that radio show, and they all like Ralph."

  "We'll let Peavy figure it out," I said.

  Red said, "Hah."

  I didn't have anything to add to that.

  It was nearly four o'clock when we got back to Picketville. I took Red by Anne's before going to the jail. There were still several cars parked in front of the house. I saw Martin York's Ford and Lance's black Acura parked side by side, felt a stab of jealousy, and then immediately felt guilty. Paul Lindeman had been dead only a few hours and already I was thinking about courting his widow.

  "You gonna come in?" Red asked.

  "No. I want to talk to Peavy while I'm still able."

  "You don't look too good, sure enough. You better go take a long nap when you get finished with Peavy."

  He got out of the truck and went slowly toward the door on his crutches. I was sorry for him, and I was sorry for Anne. I was even a little sorry for myself because I didn't know what the hell was going on. I'd come to town to find out who killed a Prairie Chicken, and now Paul Lindeman had been murdered and I'd been shot at from a bi-plane and been beaten half to death by the Amazing Colossal Man.

  Things weren't going exactly as I'd planned.

  I watched Red all the way to the porch, and when the door swung open I turned the truck in the direction of the courthouse, which was several blocks off the highway, not far from the doctor's office where I'd taken Red earlier.

  The jail and sheriff's offices were in opposite wings of the courthouse building, a big gray concrete affair that depressed rather than inspired. It looked like something from the thirties, maybe a W.P.A. project.

  I walked into the sheriff's offices, and the receptionist looked at me as if I were a jail trusty who had wandered into the wrong wing.

  "I'd like to talk to Sheriff Peavy," I told her. "My name's Truman Smith."

  She never took her eyes off me as she picked up the phone and buzzed him.

  Peavy walked out of his office to meet me. "You look like you came out on the losing end of a wrestling match with a rhino, Smith. What happened?"

  "Let's go in your office," I said. "Then I'll tell you all about it."

  "I bet it'll be mighty interesting, too," he said. "Hold my calls, Janie."

  "Yes, sheriff," the receptionist said, still looking at me as if she thought I might go for her throat at any moment.

  When we were in Peavy's office, he closed the door behind us and said, "Have a seat, Smith, and tell me what's going on. Been sticking your nose where it doesn't belong?"

  He walked around his desk and sat in a big, comfortable-looking chair, and I took the smaller, less appealing one opposite him. It wasn't even real leather.

  "I guess you could say I stuck my nose where it doesn't belong," I said. "I was trespassing, which amounts to about the same thing."

  I went on to tell him the whole story, slightly abridged to leave out the gunplay and the part about Red picking the lock on the gate. Even the cleaned-up version didn't make Peavy very happy.

  "You know, Smith," he said when I was finished, "I'm the sheriff of this county. I'm the one with a badge. Not you. Not Red Lindeman. I can sort of understand why Red would do something stupid like that. After all, it's his boy that was killed. But not you. You're supposed to know something about the law, and here you go, running off like some kind of vigilante. If you'd gotten killed, it would have served you right."

  "Thanks," I said. "I appreciate your sympathy."

  "That's real funny. But let me tell you something. If you go messing around again like that, I'm going to arrest you and see how long I can keep you locked up before some bleeding heart lawyer finds out about you and busts you out."

  I knew that he didn't really mean it. If he'd meant it, he wouldn't have given me a warning. So I shouldn't have said anything at all. But I did.

  "Like you did the man who hanged himself?"

  Peavy stood up, his hands balled into fists at his sides. "Who told you about that?"

  "Why? Is it supposed to be a secret?"

  His hands slowly relaxed. "No, it's not supposed to be a secret, but it's something else that's none of your damn business. And that's all I have to say about it."

  He sat back down and stared at me. Maybe he thought he could scare me, but a man who's been mixing it up with Gar Thornton wasn't likely to be scared of a mere county sheriff, even one who was threatening to arrest him.

  "What about Gar?" I asked. "Are you going to look for him?"

  "Sure I am. I'll look for him as soon as I have Denbow check out that airplane and make sure your story's true. Why? Do you think I don't know how to do my job?"

  "I've been told that you and Ralph Evans are pretty good friends."

  That brought him to his feet again. He put his palms flat on the desk and leaned toward me.

  "Denbow was right about you, Smith," he said. "You're a wiseass. And what's worse, you're wrong about everything. You don't even have a clue. I think you'd better get out of here now. Otherwise I might do something that we'll both be sorry for."

  I stood up slowly, which was the only way I could stand up, and smiled at him.

  "If I'm so wrong about everything," I said, "why don't you clue me in?"

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nbsp; "Because it's none of your business. You're in over your head, Smith. Now get out of here. And go back to Galveston before you get hurt."

  "Too late for that," I said, and then I got out of there.

  Twenty

  What I needed was a long hot shower and a nap. But those things would have to wait. I was getting really curious about the man who'd hanged himself at the jail, so I drove out to the radio station to see if Tony Lopez was still there.

  As I drove I turned on the radio and tuned in KLWG. The news was on, and the newscaster closed the program by saying, "This is Tony Lopez for KLWG news. For the news and weather together, tune in to KLWG at the top of every hour. We'll be there for you."

  I'd missed the news, but at least I knew that Lopez was at the station. That was all I cared about.

  It was a little early for the Ralph Evans crowd, and the parking lot was nearly empty. I went in and located the broadcasting booth. There were two men inside, one of them the engineer and one of them probably Lopez. One was wearing jeans and a t-shirt with a picture of Tweety Bird on it. The engineer, I thought. The other was wearing Dockers and a sport shirt. I figured that had to be Lopez. I tapped on the glass and when he looked around, I motioned for him to come outside.

  He was young and handsome, probably not more than twenty-five, shorter than I was, with slick black hair, black eyes, and a smooth complexion. He had a deep voice that sounded even deeper in person than it had on the radio.

  "What can I do for you?" he asked.

  I asked if he was Lopez, and when he said that he was, I told him my name and what I was doing there. He suggested that we go to his office to talk. It was next door to Paul's office and only a little smaller.

  "Paul told me about you," he said when we were inside. "But I guess you're not really interested in Prairie Chickens now. Are you going to be investigating his murder?"

  I was already investigating it, but not officially, and there wasn't likely to be any official sanction of anything I did, not as long as Peavy was sheriff. He didn't seem to like me much.

  However, considering the story that Lopez was working on, I thought he might not be the sheriff's best friend, either. So I told him the truth.

  "I'm looking into the murder, all right, but I'm not working with the sheriff. And the whole thing's got me wondering about something else, something that you might be able to help me with."

  "I liked Paul a lot," Lopez said. "He gave me this job, and he taught me nearly everything I know about radio. I'll do whatever I can."

  "I don't want you to do anything," I said. "I just need some information."

  "What about?"

  "About the man who hanged himself in the jail."

  Suddenly Lopez wasn't quite so eager to help. He dropped his eyes to his desk.

  "I don't know if I should talk to you about that," he said.

  "Why not?"

  "I'm not sure Paul would have wanted me to."

  "You said you wanted to help me, and Paul's dead. What he might have wanted doesn't matter now."

  Lopez' head jerked up. "How can you say that?"

  I didn't say anything. I just let him think about it.

  Finally he said, "OK. Maybe you're right. You probably are, because I think the hanged man does have something to do with Paul's murder."

  "Tell me about it."

  He leaned back in his chair. "All right. I don't know who the man was, but Paul did. I'm not sure how. Paul wouldn't tell me just exactly what was going on, but he was convinced that the hanging wasn't suicide. The sheriff did an investigation that cleared his office of any blame, but Paul wasn't satisfied with that."

  "Why?" I asked. "He must have had a reason."

  Lopez nodded. "I'm sure he did, but he never came right out and told me. I think I know, though. I guess you want to hear about it."

  Of course I wanted to hear about it.

  "Tell me," I said.

  "I think the man had been doing something for Paul, some kind of undercover work. Maybe an investigation into the sheriff's office. I asked Paul, but he wouldn't say. He'd just say it was private and that he didn't want to talk about it."

  "Was that all there was to it?"

  "Yes. Except for the way the man died."

  "He hanged himself. What's suspicious about that?"

  "Look," Lopez said, "he was drunk when he was arrested, right?"

  "That's what I was told."

  "OK. And there's no question about that part of it. The night he got arrested, he'd been out at the Longhorn Club. You know where that is?"

  Red and I had driven past it on our way to Evans' land. It was a long, low building just off the highway, with a gravel parking lot and a peeling paint job. The sign out front had a crude drawing of a longhorn's head on it.

  "I've seen the place," I said.

  "Well, he'd had plenty to drink there according to the bartender, and he got in a little discussion with a couple of guys who didn't like the way he was looking at their dates. The discussion got ugly, and a fight started. That's what led to the arrest."

  I wasn't sure where this was going. "So the guy's drunk and in jail. He hangs himself out of humiliation or because he just doesn't know what he's doing. Is that it?"

  "That's probably what the sheriff would like for everyone to believe. But I don't. Believe it, I mean. And neither would anyone else who'd ever been in that jail cell. Have you ever seen it?"

  "I haven't had the pleasure."

  "The bars are nearly seven feet off the floor, probably to prevent the possibility of anybody hanging himself, especially somebody about five-six or -seven, which is what this guy was. He couldn't reach the bars to tie anything to them. And the cot's bolted to the floor five feet away from the window. There's no way anyone could stand on the cot and tie anything to those bars."

  I was beginning to get the picture. "So he had a little help."

  Lopez frowned. "Or a lot of help. He must have. And he had a visitor."

  Now there was some news worth knowing. "Who?"

  "But the visitor swore that the man was alive when he left the cell."

  "So would I if I'd hanged him. Who was the visitor?"

  "He's a big guy. He could have hung that little guy with no trouble at all."

  Tony really knew how to drag out a story. "OK, OK. Tell me who it was."

  I thought I'd already figured it out, so I wasn't at all surprised when he said, "Gar Thornton."

  There was more to the story, of course. There's always more. Gar had been one of the men at the Longhorn Club, and he'd been involved in both the "discussion" and the fight.

  "Gar can talk?" I said.

  "When he wants to." Lopez grinned. "He usually doesn't want to. Hell, he doesn't have to."

  I knew what he meant. "If he got into an argument with Gar, the guy must have really been drunk."

  "They did a blood test. Alcohol level was about twice the legal limit."

  "You wouldn't think that would have affected his judgment enough to make him want to fight Gar."

  "That's what Paul thought. He talked to the bartender, Roy Nobles, and Roy said it looked to him like Gar and his buddy picked the fight."

  "Wait a minute. His buddy. That wouldn't be Bert Ware by any chance, would it?"

  "No. It was some guy named Steve Stilwell, looks a little like Sam Elliott on a bad hair day. Anyway, Gar and Bert don't hang out together. Except when they're doing bodyguard duty with Ralph."

  "Do you think Paul could have had this man looking into something to do with Evans?"

  "That could be. He wouldn't say. I think he would have told me sooner or later, but he just wasn't ready. He wanted to see what I could turn up first."

  "What else have you found out?"

  "Nothing, really. I just found out about Gar being the visitor a few days ago. I finally found somebody at the jail who'd talk to me about it. Gar came in and said that he wanted to apologize to the guy, that he was sorry he'd been arrested. So he got in to see him."


  "And the jailor didn't notice anything funny when Gar left? Like a guy hanging from the bars?"

  "He says he didn't. He may even be telling the truth. It was late at night, and he was probably sleepy. He might never even have looked into the cell, or Gar could have blocked his view. Gar's a pretty big guy."

  I could vouch for that. "What did Paul say when you told him about Gar's visit?"

  "He got really excited. He told me he had some calls to make and that he'd let me know more when he'd found out a few things. He never got around to it, though."

  "What about the men who came to town later, the ones who seemed interested in the hanging?"

  "I don't know about them. I mean, I know about them, but I don't know who they were or where they came from. They didn't give much away. The sheriff knows, I'll bet, since they spent a lot of time talking to him. But if he knows anything, he's not telling."

  No surprise there. I didn't blame him. In a case like this, you needed to keep things as quiet as possible.

  There was one other thing I wanted to know. I said, "What was the guy's name?"

  "The one who hanged himself? It was Lloyd. Lloyd Abbott."

  "Damn," I said.

  "What?" Lopez asked.

  "Lloyd Abbott. I know him, sort of. He's a private eye."

  I'd met Abbott only once, but I remembered him. Short, loud, and a reputation for hitting the bottle. And with exactly the right name to make him the kind of investigator Paul Lindeman would hire if Paul had wanted a professional to look into irregularities in the sheriff's office. Abbott would have been one of the first private investigators listed in the Houston Yellow Pages. I wondered if he had a partner, and I knew I'd have to find out.

  Lopez stood up. His chair squeaked, sounding a lot like the door at Evans' hangar. I winced.

  "You don't look so good," Evans said. "Can I get you something to drink? We have a soda machine."

  "Does it have Big Red?"

  "Yeah. Nobody ever drinks it, though."

  "I will, but I can get it myself." I stood up to prove how tough I was. "Show me the way."

  We went out of the office and down the hall to the green room. There was a machine in an alcove nearby, and I fished quarters out of my pocket and fed them to the coin slot.