Malpractice in Maggody (18 page)

“They all know what happened,” I said, “but if you’d like to maintain the pretense, the deputy can get prints off their drinking glasses. Tell the kitchen aides to label the trays with names and set them aside.”

“Is this really necessary?”

“The reasonably bright girl you hoped to promote to supervisor one of these days is dead. I’m going to do everything I can to find her killer. If you have a problem with this, call the state attorney general or whomever and complain. I doubt you can get me kicked off the case until Monday, though. The sheriff’s spending the weekend in a boat in the middle of some lake, drinking whiskey and cussing at the bass for not taking his bait.” I stood up and headed toward the parking lot. “Come Monday morning, you’ll see either me or someone else. Don’t count on my replacement being a real sensitive guy. It’s not part of the job description.”

If he had a reply, I didn’t hear it. I drove back to the PD and called LaBelle, who was too busy giving herself a manicure to run me through the wringer. I gave her a detailed request for a fingerprint technician and a translator, then reluctantly included a certain telephone number in Springfield. The only message on the answering machine was from Ruby Bee, who had a few choice remarks about grand theft auto. I didn’t bother to call her back, since I’d left the keys in the ignition and she could fetch her car when she got around to it.

There remained only one thing to do before I packed a bag and hit the road. I unfolded the note I’d stuck in my pocket and reread it. It was hard to imagine Eileen running away to become a cowboy—or running away
with
a cowboy, for that matter. Unless she changed course, she would bump into the Canadian border within a week. And then what?

I called the SuperSaver and asked to speak to Kevin. Idalupino agreed to chase him down, but warned me it might take a while, since he’d left a case of ice cream on the loading dock all morning and was still hiding out from Jim Bob. When he finally came to the phone, I told him about the credit card and the list of cities.

“Oh, my gawd,” he gurgled. “So where is she now?”

“My best guess is still in Wyoming,” I said. “It’s a big state.”

“What’s she doing there?”

“Beats me. You’d better tell your pa.”

“He’s been drunk so long he won’t hear a word I say, except the part about Wyoming. You should be the one to tell him, Arly. You’re the chief of police.”

“If you’re too scared to tell him, then don’t.”

Fifteen minutes later I was on the road—and not to Wyoming.

“I
can’t believe Arly left town without so much as a word,” said Estelle, having heard about it from Bordella Buchanon, who’d been picking up beer cans along the side of the road. “Especially after the way she spoke to you earlier this afternoon. If I was you, I wouldn’t give her the time of day after she comes skulking back from wherever she went.”

Ruby Bee finished washing a couple of mugs and set them on the draining board. “She doesn’t have to account to me, as she’s so fond of claiming. After all, I’m just her mother. It’s not like I worked my fingers to the bone to buy her new shoes for school and ruffled dresses for Easter. One year I stayed up all night sewing feathers on her costume for a school play. She was a bluebird, or maybe a blue jay—I disremember which. I nearly sneezed my head off.”

Estelle toyed with her sherry glass. “You know, I find it real interesting that these so-called patients are famous. I wonder who they are.”

“I don’t see how we can find out, short of climbing over the fence and peeking in windows. Arly said we wouldn’t have heard of them, anyway.”

“I don’t see how she can be so sure,” Estelle continued, her eyes narrowed. “Just because she doesn’t read
People
magazine doesn’t mean the rest of us don’t. Britney Spears and Brad Pitt could be there, and Arly wouldn’t recognize them.”

Ruby Bee couldn’t help but agree. “Movie stars are all the time going to expensive private hospitals on account of alcohol or drug problems. It’s amazing any of them ever actually finds time to make a movie, what with the way they keep getting engaged, married, divorced—sometimes all on the same day. Wouldn’t it be something if a really famous celebrity was hiding out not even a mile away from here?”

“I can think of a way we might find out.”

“I’m not about to sit in that persimmon tree, if that’s what you’re thinking,” said Ruby Bee. “I got better things to do, and so do you.”

“What about the Mexicans in the motel out back? They must know who the patients are.”

“Are you forgetting they don’t speak English?”

Estelle pulled out her ace in the hole, which in this case turned out to be a book in her handbag. “I dropped by the high school yesterday to ask Lottie for her lemon pound cake recipe. While she was hunting it down for me, I went across the hall to the library and found this Spanish book for beginners.”

“You stole it? I am shocked, Estelle Oppers. Stealing books from a library is worse than—than filching money from the collection plate!”

“I did no such thing. I simply borrowed it, and I’ll make sure it’s back on the shelf before school starts at the end of the summer. No one will even notice it’s missing.”

“Let me see it.” Ruby Bee opened the book and flipped through a couple of pages. “This might come in handy if you want to find the train station or order ham ’n eggs for breakfast, but I don’t see where it says how to ask about celebrities’ names.”

“We can patch together some questions from the vocabulary list at the back,” Estelle said. “All we need are Spanish words for name, patient, movie star, and so on.”

“Why on God’s green earth would they tell us? If you recollect, we ate the guacamole while we were talking about your old flame in Little Rock. You gonna go all the way to Farberville and buy some more avocados—or are you planning to bribe ’em with pretzels?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of a fresh apple pie. They eat more than tacos and tamales in Mexico.” She pulled the book back across the bar. “You fetch a pencil and a piece of paper, and we’ll make a list of words they’ll understand. It may not be easy, but that ain’t never stopped us yet.”

Ruby Bee could think of a lot of things that
should
have stopped them, and Arly could probably reel off a lot more. But asking the maids a few questions wasn’t near the same as getting arrested for trespassing at the Stonebridge Foundation. All she and Estelle were gonna do was satisfy their curiosity, for pity’s sake.

On that note, she opened a drawer and found a stubby pencil. “See if you can find out how to say ‘Brad Pitt’ in Spanish,” she suggested while she tore off a page from the order pad and turned it over.

Kevin sat on the loading dock behind the SuperSaver, so slumped over he was in danger of tumbling off. He felt like he was strapped to two mules, each of them determined to go in a different direction. If he went to his pa’s house and told him that his ma was in Wyoming, he’d get his ass whupped something awful. If he went home and told Dahlia, he’d spend the rest of the night listening to her bawl him out like it was his fault. Little Kevvie Junior and Rose Marie would get all scared and start screaming, and he didn’t even want to think what Dahlia’s granny might do. The last time she’d gotten spooked, she’d spent half the day on the roof, gnawin’ shingles.

He darn near jumped out of his skin when a hand clamped down on his shoulder. Before he could turn around, Jim Bob sat down next to him and said, “Shouldn’t you be at home, boy?”

“I was just sittin’ here for a minute,” he said, hoping he wasn’t gonna get chewed out again about the ice cream. There were sticky patches at the end of the dock, although it was hard to see ’em under the swarm of yellow jackets and flies. “You want me to hose it down before I leave? I could get a scrub brush and—”

”Naw, it can wait till tomorrow.” Jim Bob took a pint bottle of whiskey out of his pocket. “Wanna snort?”

Kevin gaped at him. “No, sir. I mean, it’s right kindly of you to offer, but if I go home and Dahlia smells it, she’ll smack me across the room. She’s got a nose like a bloodhound.”

“Women,” Jim Bob muttered. “Sometimes they get too big for their britches. You got to remind ’em of their place before they get so uppity that ain’t no one can tell them what to do. Am I right, boy?”

“Oh, yeah, Jim Bob, right as rain. Jest this morning Dahlia—”

”The only thing we can do is stop ’em before they start screeching about how they’re better than us men. The minute they start bossing us around, we might as well put on their pantyhose and start scrubbing toilets.” He took a gulp of whiskey and offered the bottle to Kevin. “Don’t sit there like you’re already pussy-whipped. If you want to have a snort after work, it ain’t none of Dahlia’s business. You ain’t no little sissy in short pants. Go on, take it.”

Kevin’s hand was shaking so fierce he could barely hold the bottle. There was something so peculiar about him passing a bottle with Jim Bob that he couldn’t begin to sort it out. “I sure as hell ain’t no sissy,” he said as he took a sip. He had to clamp his lips together so’s not to spit it out. “Might fine whiskey, Jim Bob.”

“Damn straight, considering it cost more than two dollars.” Jim Bob slapped him on the back. “Kevin, I was thinkin’ you might want to play a little poker with Roy, Larry Joe, and me tomorrow night. Go on, boy, have some more—unless you’re scared of your own wife.”

“Me?” Kevin hooted, then took a swallow. Tears came to his eyes, but he blinked them away. Not once he could remember when Jim Bob had ever talked to him, unless it was to cuss him out for being stupid or lazy. He was so bewildered that he took another swallow. “You got a point, Jim Bob,” he said as he wiped his chin with his wrist. “Once a man lets hisself be pussy-whipped, he’s a goner.”

“How’s your pa doin’ these days?”

“Been drunk as a skunk for a week now,” Kevin said proudly. “He hasn’t changed his underwear once, and he stinks to high heaven. The whole house smells like an auction barn in August.”

Jim Bob belched. “On account of his wife running off. I’d never have thought Earl would stand for that kind of shit.” He took the bottle from Kevin and allowed himself a sip before passing it back. “Women got no business running off whenever it suits their fancy. Us men are the ones who bring home the bacon.”

Kevin was beginning to develop a taste for the whiskey. “Amen to that. Ain’t a woman alive that could put meat on the table. All they’re good for is cookin’, cleanin’, and having babies.”

Jim Bob whacked Kevin on the back, then stood up. “I knew I could count on you, boy. After all, you got Buchanon blood running through your veins.”

“Damn right,” Kevin managed to say before he threw up on his shoes.

“Well?” Jack said as he handed me a glass of wine. “Do we have an issue?”

I leaned my head on his chest. “I don’t have any issues. No, I take that back. I have a stack of issues of
Better Homes & Gardens
dating back to my birth. Ruby Bee’s a real optimist.”

“You’ve been distracted from the moment you arrived. While I was cooking the steaks, you paced around like an inmate in a prison exercise yard.”

“Did I really?”

“You really did,” he said, stroking my cheek. “I may not be the most perceptive guy on the planet, but I know when something’s wrong. Are you sorry you came?”

“I can’t think of any place I’d rather be than right here with you. It’s just that I left a real mess back in Maggody. I can’t forget about poor Molly Foss. She might have been an angel, or she might have been an unscrupulous bitch, but now she’s just a body in the morgue.”

Jack had heard a brief synopsis of the case earlier, but had not pressed me for details. “Is there something you think you should be doing right now?”

“No,” I admitted grumpily. “The doctors are as slippery as greased piglets, and the patients aren’t any better. The senator wouldn’t have bothered to glance down if she tripped over my body. I’ve already offended two of the others by not recognizing them, or at least their names. The fourth one is a pro athlete. All I know about athletes is that they get paid enormous salaries for playing a game a few months every year.”

“You don’t know the patients’ names?”

I frowned as I tried to think. “One of the doctors told me their names, but the only one I recognized was the senator. Have you heard of a writer named Dibbins?”

“He’s at this clinic? No wonder he needs anonymity. He writes best-selling diet books that recommend pasta drenched in olive oil and served with garlic bread. One of the reviewers called Dibbins’s first book ‘Dr. Death’s Diet of Doom.’ What’s he in for?”

“Can you keep a secret?”

“Anything that happens on this sofa will stay strictly between the two of us,” he murmured, then proceeded to engage me in some private maneuvers that I certainly wouldn’t share with a reporter. Or my mother, who’d rather eat live lizards than admit she even knew folks did things like that.

After half an hour of convincing me of his sincerity, he sat up and took a drink of wine. “I’ll assume Dibbins did too much research on the recipes in his books. What do you know about the athlete?”

“Nothing,” I admitted as I buttoned my shirt. “I was told his name, but it didn’t mean anything to me. I caught a glimpse of him in the pool. Young, blond hair, muscular, tight butt, maybe six-foot-four. I couldn’t see his face.”

Jack smiled. “Doesn’t sound like you tried too hard.”

I ignored his remark. “I can’t imagine the diet guru or the senator being sent to rehab by a judge. That leaves this guy and the whiny actress.”

“I can think of one athlete who might qualify. Could this guy’s name be Toby Mann?”

“That’s it,” I said. “You’ve heard of him, I gather. What did he do?”

“He’s accused of raping a woman in his hotel room. The trial was postponed at the request of his lawyers. ‘The Man,’ as he’s called, is one of the highest-paid football players in the league. He drives expensive cars and dates models. He comes across as a jerk in interviews, but he’s a fantastic quarterback.”

“Did he rape her?” I asked.

Jack shrugged. “Nobody else was in the hotel room, so maybe, maybe not. ‘The Man’s Fans’ don’t care as long as he keeps throwing touchdown passes.”

“From what I was told, Molly Foss was more than attractive. Toby must have been getting pretty bored at the clinic…”

“So bored that he raped her, and then drowned her to keep her quiet?”

“The coroner didn’t find any evidence that she was sexually assaulted. Damn, it would have been nice to tidy this up with a phone call. On Monday, I could have been questioning this jock in a cell at the county jail. I’m really not excited about going back to the Stonebridge Foundation to face Brenda Skiller. We didn’t exactly hit it off.”

“What’s she going to do—fire you?”

“Good point,” I said. “I suppose she could stir up some trouble for me at the sheriff’s office, but Harve’s not going to do anything more than nod and then hustle her out the door. And if the Maggody city council decides to get rid of me, so be it. I never planned to stay there forever.”

Jack started to say something, then stopped and swirled the wine in the bottom of his glass. “So tell me about the actress.”

“Her first name is Dawn. In her early twenties, looks like a cast member of
The Night of the Living Dead.
She said she’d been in a TV series a long time ago.”

“Dawn Dartmouth,” Jack said promptly. “She was in some sitcom when she was a kid. She had a twin sister who was also on the show, since there are stringent rules about how long a kid can be on camera on any day. Were you too busy drinking moonshine and tipping cows to watch TV?”

“We weren’t what you’d call prosperous when I was growing up. Ruby Bee had a little black-and-white TV that someone gave her. The reception was so bad that watching it gave me headaches. Before you get too carried away imagining me barefoot and dressed in rags, let me assure you we had all the necessities and enough for a few extras. We weren’t any better or worse off than most of the folks in town. I may have tipped a cow or two, but I spent most of my free time sitting on the banks of Boone Creek, drinking beer and plotting my escape.”