Marcie's Murder (4 page)

“He wasn’t wearing those clothes,”
Chief Askew
snapped, turning his glare on Branham.

“Even so,” the little guy insisted.

“But this guy
got into the car you described
,” Askew said.
“
License plate and all
.”

“Yeah,
most like
. But
this
h
ain’t
the
fella
walked by the window
. That
fella
was bigger, and his face was longer and bonier than this
fella
’s
.”

“Jesus
fucking
Christ.”
Askew
pushed by them and went back
down the corridor and
out the metal door.

“Come on, Pete,” Branham said. He glanced at Hank without expression before guiding their witness down the corridor after the departed
c
hief
of
p
olice
.

About two hours later Branham came in with a paper
bag
and a
S
tyrofoam cup. He opened the cell door and handed them to Hank.

“Sorry we missed breakfast,” the
d
eputy said, “but I brought you some lunch compliments of the town of Harmony.”

“Thanks.” Hank took the paper
bag
and sat down on the edge of the cot. He took out a smoked meat sandwich on light rye bread.
It tasted good.
He washed it down with a mouthful of decent coffee as another man walked into the cell. This one was
medium height
and thin, with wavy steel gray hair. His cheeks and nose were red-veined
. He
had the look of a confirmed alcoholic. He wore a rumpled dark green suit and scuffed black shoes. His hands
were
shoved in
to
his pockets and his eyes roamed around the cell instead of meeting Hank’s.

“This is
Ansell Hall,
our detective,” Branham
said
. “We only have the one. I imagine you have quite a few.”

Hank swallowed a mouthful of sandwich. “
A
few
.”

Branham nodded.

“You guys care to tell me what I’m doing here?”

“First, why don’t you
take
us through what you did last night? When did you get in town?”

Hank walked them through it, from checking into the motel to where he ate, the walk he took, the cigars he bought, what he watched on television back in his room, the final score of the ball game and what he thought of the Orioles, his trip back out for beer
,
and the stop at the run-down bar where he had two before coming back to his room and going to bed.

“What time were you at the bar?”

“Got there at about 11:20
p.m.
and left about
midnight
.”
Hank put his empty coffee cup into the paper
bag
and handed it to Branham.

“What’d you do while you were there?”

“Sat at a table, looked around, drank a couple of beers, went to the can
,
and left.”

“Just two beers?”

“Just the two. Nothing else. Then I left.”

As he talked, Hank kept glancing at Detective Hall, but the man steadfastly refused to look at him. Hank wondered what the hell kind of a detective he was.

“You didn’t go around to the back of the place at any time?” Branham asked.

“The back?”

“Outside. Did you go outside and around the side of the place to the back?”

“What the hell for? Of course
not
.”

“You were seen by a witness passing the kitchen window,” Hall said in a raspy smoker’s voice.

“The hell I was,” Hank retorted
testily
. “That witness already changed his tune
. You need to keep up on current events, Detective
.”

Hall looked in confusion at Branham, who merely rolled his eyes.

“Come on,” Hank said, “I’m trying to be real patient here, but there’s a limit. What the hell’s going on?”

“A woman was killed last night at the back of that bar where you stopped in for a couple of beers
,” Branham said
.
“
Right around the time you were there.
Someone strangled her and left her body down the ravine behind the place.”

Hank digested this for a moment, then looked at Branham. “If she was strangled, you don’t need my gun, right? You’ll be returning it as soon as I get out of here, right?”

Branham sighed. “Tazewell took it. They’ll release it in due course.”

“Tazewell?”

“The County Sheriff’s
Office
. We’re too
small
for crime scene technicians and all
the
sort of stuff you take for granted, so we call the
s
heriff’s
o
ffice
and they send their crime scene processing van. It’s only the second time this year we’ve needed it. There’s not a lot of violent crime around here.”

“So you’re telling me my weapon
’
s in another part of the state somewhere and I’ll get it back God
knows
when?”

“It’s just down the road in Tazewell and it’ll come back
real
soon if you
stay
patient and let this all work itself out.”

“Well
,
now I feel a hell of a lot better.
A
re y
ou going to keep me here or transport me somewhere else?
”

“Lucky you,” Branham
replied
.
“
Y
ou get to stay here as our guest. Normally we’d ship you to Tazewell but the
c
hief wants you to stay handy.
”

“Lucky me,” Hank
echoed
.

“Who was at the bar while you were there, Lieutenant Donaghue?”
Branham asked, changing the subject.

Hank looked at Hall. “You want to take notes while I’m talking?”

Hall looked confused again, but Branham
cleared his throat
. “Detective Hall has a photographic memory.”

“I’ll bet he does.” Hank shot his hand through his frizzy brown hair. “Two women were serving, an older one and a younger one
, both white
.
Older one was in her middle forties, five-six, one fifty, wavy dark hair, looked exhausted. Younger one was in her early twenties, five-nine, one thirty, short straight brown hair. Cute and flirty. Guy behind the bar was white, middle thirties, five-ten, two hundred, short straight blond hair. The girls got their own orders so I figure the guy was
the
manager.”

“Customers?” Branham prompted.

“When I got there, there was a young guy at the bar. White, early twenties, maybe five
-
ten, two
twenty, pudgy, short, light brown hair, kept to himself. At a table by himself was a white guy, middle forties, looked like a construction worker or something, five
-
nine, one
sixty, short gray hair.
At another table were three white guys, maybe in their thirties, all medium height, medium build.”

“Any of them leave before you did?”

“None of them did. They were there when I walked in and they were still there when I walked out.” Hank paused. “When I got there, there were two bikers outside in the parking lot shooting the shit. They came inside a few minutes after I did and sat at the bar. They were still there when I left.
No gang colors, just leather jackets with Harley crests. Tattoos, but I wasn’t close enough to make them out.
Pennsylvania plates.” He dictated the license plate numbers from memory. “
Some other guy walked in while I was there. Guy
about forty
but still athletic-looking, as though he’d been a big
deal
back in the day. Wore a bla
ck sport
jacket and jeans. Short black hair,
thin face
,
pale blue eyes,
big hands,
five
-
ten or five
-
eleven
,
one
ninety to
two hundred. Drank a beer and left before I did.”

Hall stirred.
“Sounds like Morris
.”

“Morris?”

Branham looked uncomfortable. “David Morris. Former
c
hief of
p
olice.”

“A cop,” Hank mused.

“Former.” Branham
looked
at him. “Anything else?’

Hank thought for a moment. “No. Oh, wait. Yeah. A woman was standing out front as I walked in. She took a look at me like she was waiting for someone. Nice
looking, early forties, five
-
nine,
maybe
one
thirty
,
good figure,
dark complexion, dark wavy hair
, pretty dress with big flowers on it and black shoes
with
maybe
a
one-inch
heel
. Looked upset about something.”

“Oh, hell,” Hall said softly.

“What?” Hank asked. “
Some
one
you know
?”

“Yeah,” Branham said.
“The victim.”

“Who was she?”

“Marcie Askew,” Branham told him
.
“Chief Askew’s wife.”

6

It was the middle of the afternoon when
the metal door
down at the end of the corridor
opened
again. A
heavy, middle-aged woman
wedged it open with a chunk of wood
and
pushed a trolley cart down the corridor to the
washroom at the end. She wore a pale blue dress that looked like
the
uniform for a cleaning company, white sneakers, latex gloves
,
and white terry cotton wristbands.
W
histl
ing
softly off key
,
she
went
into the washroom to clean the toilet.

“Afternoon,” Hank called out.

The woman ignored him, whistling and scrubbing as though completely alone in the universe.

“What time is it?”

The tune was
“
Jingle Bells
.
”
She was whistling
“
Jingle Bells
,
”
for chrissakes
, in the middle of
September
.
Enough was enough.

Hank stood at the door of his cell and
looked down at the open metal door
. “Hey!” he called out. “Hey,
O
fficer
!”

Oh what fun it is to ride
….

“HEY! OUT THERE AT THE DESK!
HEY
!
HEY, ARE YOU DEAD OUT THERE?”

A uniformed officer stuck his head through the doorway. “Shut your fucking mouth.”

“Hey! Tell Branham it’s time for my phone call! Right now!”

“Deputy Chief went home, now shut the fuck up.”

“Is Hall out there? Tell Hall I want to talk to him right now!”

“You don’t need to talk to nobody, mister. Don’t make me come down there and bust your fuckin
’
head for you.”

“Hall!
HALL
!
Get the hell in here right now!”

The uniformed officer disappeared and Detective Hall
shuffled
down the corridor to Hank’s cell.

“You don’t have to yell, Lieutenant. They can hear you clear to Bluefield.”

“I want to make a phone call, Detective. Right now.”

Hall looked dubious. “Chief Askew’s got to give his permission for that, and he
’s
not
around
. It better wait.”

“It’s not going to wait, Detective, and that’s that. I make a phone call right now or my attorney
’s going to be filing lawsuits with your name on them. Now let me out of here and let me make my call.”