The Redneck Detective Agency (The Redneck Detective Agency Mystery Series Book 1) (16 page)

Chapter 33

Freddy’s Place was this yuppie restaurant joint on the north side of the square. Sammy ate there at least twice a week. Rusty thought the place was about twenty percent overpriced, so he went there sparingly.

              Freddy’s Place was dark, had a lot of dark woodwork, and big roomy booths. It was long and deep--in Rusty’s day the place housed Belue’s Work Clothing Store--and had the flavor of a place where deals were made. Rusty thought they had a decent sirloin steak and it reminded him of an English Pub he and Jenny used to frequent in Quito.

              Sammy sat alone in a back booth, with his spread out before him--a filet mignon, a salad, some vegetables, and a basket of bread along with an Australian beer.

              Rusty walked straight back, hoping nobody would notice him and slid in opposite Sammy.

              “Hey, man. Want something to eat?” Sammy said.

              “No, I’m fine. With food. Otherwise, I’m a little jumpy. Can you get right to the point.”

              “Sure. It turns out Dr. Compton was worth about thirty million dollars.”

              The figure stunned Rusty. When he came to his senses, he commented, “That’s real money by even big city standards.”

              “Yes it is.”

              “His four assorted kids divide up half the estate.”

              “Who gets the other half?” Rusty asked.

              “Your ex-wife.”

              Rusty just sat there in a daze with those very words “your ex-wife” scorching the deep recesses of his mind.

              “If you’re speechless, just sit there and listen to me, Rusty. The will was done two weeks before Compton got killed. He didn’t have put in his dear, loving wife. Just Jenny’s name. So, the will will be valid even though they never married.”

              “How do you know all this?”

              “I have my inside sources. Like from Compton’s personal estate attorney. Jenny doesn’t know this. Starr doesn’t know this. And he won’t until about a week, when the sealed will is read.

              “Next week when they find out Jenny stands to inherit about fifteen million dollars or more because of his death, she’ll be suspect number one. Believe me.”

              “They’ll think she killed him? And drop the charges on me?”

              “Not exactly. The dynamite. No, their theory will be you did the dirty deed but that she put you up to do it.”

              “But if she didn’t know she was already in his will, I mean, what’s the logic in that? How could a jury buy that? If you are a greedy gold digging bitch, why kill your fiancée and get half when you could marry him and get all of it?”

              Sammy laughed. “Tell me about it.”

              “So, they’ll play it that she knew?”

              “Sure. And they will come to you and interrogate you very heavily and then offer you a deal. A year in prison to testify against Jenny.”

              “What for me to perjure?”

              “No. They think you did it. The sheriff’s department is sure of it. It’s just too classic.”

              “And what do you propose I do, Sammy?”

              “Just pray the State Attorney saves your ass.”

              “What? He’s doing something?”

              “Found out something about the hospital. They’re talking about six months ago some merger or take-over or whatever they want to call it was about to take place. Compton stood to make tens of millions of dollars over the course of a decade on it. There could be something there. But I’m just telling you, Rusty. You better brace yourself for this thing to really blow up.

              “Compton--rich and hung out with the rich and beautiful. Was going to marry pretty Jenny. Has beautiful kids, has beautiful ex-wives. He’s the whole package.               “Celebrity News. Millions of dollars. It’ll be a circus. Script writers from Hollywood will be in the courtroom. The news reporters that want to get their own cable show. Guys like them will be in the courtroom. It’ll make Starr the star he wants desperately to be.”

              Rusty slapped his hands on the table. “I don’t know what to say.”

              Sammy shrugged.

              “So, what’s new with you, Sammy?”

              “The DA in Florence, before he was DA, had been involved with Elmore King in a restaurant deal. So when they arrest somebody on that case, it wouldn’t stand for him to handle the case. I agreed to take it.”

              “I got an alibi for that one. Only trouble is, you’ll have to come get me out of the courtroom drama in Madison County, bring me over here to testify that he gave me five thousand dollars to find his stole two hundred fourteen pound catfish.”

              Rusty laughed.

              Sammy smiled, swallowed his mouthful of food and said, “You’re going to be a busy man, Rusty.”

              “I already am. Listen, what’s the requirements for being a licensed private detective?”

              “Able and willing to turn over sixty-two dollars to Travertine County.”

              “What?”

              “In the State of Alabama, private detective licensing is left up to each individual county. No previous experience, schooling, tests, anything is required. In Travertine County it’s…”             

              “Sixty-two dollars.”

              “Right. You are going to become a licensed private detective?”

              “Got an office, a company name. A door. Might as well.”

              “And you have sixty-two dollars?”

              “I do.”

Chapter 34

Rusty walked across the street to the courthouse and up the marble staircase to the second floor and down the hall to the Occupational Licensing Department. He stood at the vacant window of the department and hit the little bell.

              Three seconds later she stared right at Evil Eye Edwards. His old eighth grade math teacher.

              “Mrs. Edwards?” What he meant to say was--I thought you were long dead. You were old and ugly and mean forty years ago. Shit fire.

              “Rusty Clay. How are you doing, honey?”

              “Just fine.” She, besides Gloria, was the only woman Rusty personally knew who had knifed a man.

              “I’m hope you get out of that bum murder rap. Anybody in their right mind would have knowed you didn’t do that.” Mrs. Edwards was a whiz at math, but had never mastered the art of proper grammar. A disgrace for a teacher, Rusty now thought.

              “Well, thank you.”

              “What can I do you today, Rusty? You need to renew your commercial fishing license?”

              “No, ma’am.”

              “You need to renew your mussel fishing license?”

              “No, ma’am.”

              “Well, you don’t need no schemes and dreams license, Rusty.”

              “I want to get a private detective license.”

              “Well, I’ll be damned. And I guess the name of it would be The Redneck Detective Agency?”

              “No, ma’am. I was thinking to call it The River Clay Detective Agency.”

              “That sounds very official. You never know how someone will define redneck.”

              “My thoughts exactly.” Especially one Gloria Davenport.

              Mrs. Edwards walked over to a file cabinet, opened it, took out a form and came back and put it on the counter in front of Rusty.

              “You are the only person to ever apply for a private detective license in Travertine County.”

              “Apply? You mean I might not get it?”

              “If you don’t fork over sixty-two dollars and fourteen cents.”

              “I thought it was just sixty-two dollars.”

              “You thought wrong, honey. Fourteen cents worth.”

              Rusty paid, got his license and walked across the street and up to his office. The place felt stuffy so he turned on the window unit to knock out the stale heat. He got himself a Dr Pepper out of the refrigerator, went over, sat at his roll desk and sipped his soda. A licensed private eye.

              As corny as it was--Rusty knew what it was he had to do. He had to earn that five thousand dollars. He had to find out who killed Elmore “Katfish” King.

              Who killed King, killed Compton.

              Using the untraceable cell Al gave him, he called directory assistance and asked for the number to Dolopia, College. He was connected at no extra charge.

              He listened to the Dolopia College phone menu. After three choices with four more to go, he hit O. The phone receptionist came on.

              “President’s office, please,” Rusty said.

              After listening to some clicking around: “President’s Office. Mrs. Wiley speaking.”

              “Mrs. Wiley, this is Rusty Clay. I would like to speak to Dr. Vargas. I know he’s a busy man, but if you could just tell him Rusty would like to speak to him for a just a minute?”

              “Hold on, Mr. Clay,” the secretary said, like she knew who he was.

              In a minute, the phone clicked to another line and Rusty heard: “Rusty, how’s life?”

              “Better now that I own a Mercedes.”

              Dr. Vargas laughed. “How’s the engine work coming?”

              “I’m a busy man, but I have my cousin on it. Listen, do you happen to have your senior year book from high school?”

              “Great minds think alike, Mr. Clay. I just spent two hours rummaging through storage last night. Yes, I do have it. It’s at the house.”

              “Could I borrow it for a few hours? I’ll take good care of it.”

              “Of course. I’m going home at six. I’m freshening up and going right back out to an event, but I’ll leave it in the vestibule. You could come by after seven, my wife or the maid will be there to give it to you.”

              “Thanks. And listen, I still think this is a serial killer. You are a prominent professional from the same graduating class. I would keep on my toes if I were you.”

              “Thank you for the compliment, Rusty. And I am a bit nervous. That’s why I am keeping myself under security at all times.”

              “Security?”

              “Yes. I have the campus security outside my door right now. He goes with me everywhere now.”

              “You mean Vernon Peoples?”

              “Yes, you know him?”

              “Sort of. He was in my graduating class. And he was kicked off the Dolopia Police Department for incompetence.”

              “I didn’t know that.”

              “You have to be pretty incompetent to be kicked off the Dolopia Police Department for incompetence.”

Chapter 35

As soon as Rusty put the receiver back down in the cradle, he heard the door downstairs creak open. Quick, footsteps, footsteps of a man, light, quick and with purpose. Then the shadow of a figure in the translucent glass, then a quick, polite rap on the door.

              Rusty went over and opened the door. It was the last person Rusty expected to see at his office. Unless he was standing behind an entourage of armed officers.

              There stood Jeffery Starr.

              “How’d you like the Crippled Crawfish?” Rusty said. It just blurted out of his mouth. He looked Starr up and down.

              Starr looked all professional with his hair slicked back. Had on a suit, but no tie. The new warrior.

              “I caught a three pound bass on it not half an hour after you gave it to me. Thank you very much.”

              “Shit.” Rusty’s number one enemy in the world and Rusty contributed to him catching a bass. A sin he’d have to live with. If Starr could catch a bass on Rusty’s granddaddy’s lure, well, he needed to convince Ray to give up his idea about bottling Clear Springs water. They needed to market that thing. Get Duane Pylant to promote it for them. Sometimes opportunity was right under your nose.

              “Come on in,” Rusty said. What else could he do but entertain the enemy?

              Rusty even offered him the soda, but Starr declined. Rusty offered him a seat and Starr took him up on it. He sat at the flat desk by the window, right in the seat where Katfish King had settled his ass.

              Rusty sat across from him. Starr put his hands up on the desk and said, “Tomorrow I’m going before the judge and have murder charges dropped against you. For purposes best kept secret at this time, I’m going to still name you as a person of interest.”

              It was a trick. Add that with the information Sammy just gave Rusty. But maybe Starr knew about the inheritance Jenny was going to get. Yeah, drop the charges so he could arrest him the next day for murder for hire or some shit. No bond this time.

              What could Rusty say? “What? That Cripple Crawfish change your mind?”

              “No. After I got back to the office, from catching the bass on the Cripple Crawfish, a sixteen year old girl came to see me. Arzula Samples. She saw your picture on the news. She said she and her boyfriend drove to Dismal Canyon the night of the murder. They were going to camp out, but saw an El Camino parked on the ridge, knew they wouldn’t be alone, so went somewhere else. They came back the next morning. The El Camino was still there and they saw you that morning.”

              “Yes, they did.” Rusty was saved by that gold necklace. If he had chosen not to go over and give it back to her, she could never have clearly identified him.

              Rusty didn’t think Crazy Boy and Crazy Girl seeing him that morning would be much toward an alibi. Make him look more guilty. That he’d run there to hide out. But if they saw his El Camino there the night before, before Compton was murdered, it would put doubt in a jury or judge’s mind.

              That was all when Rusty was supposed to be the jealous ex committing a crime of passion . What about now, when Rusty was to do it in collusion with Jenny? That he parked his El Camino there, Jenny picked him up and took him to the crime scene, drove him back? Making it all convoluted? Yes, Rusty hadn’t had his license an hour and he was starting to think like a cynical detective.

              “So, I have an alibi?” Rusty said.

              “Somewhat.”

              Somewhat? “Do you still think I did it somehow?”

              “I was certain you did it. Now, I don’t believe so. I have to be certain to convince a jury. When the killer is found, I will put him or her away. I guarantee you that.”

              “Believe me when I say, Mr. Starr, that I’m with you one hundred percent on finding who did this murder and putting him away for good.” Rusty conveniently omitted ‘or her’ on purpose for Starr’s benefit.

              Starr said, in the snidest of all possible tones, “I’m sure you are, Mr. Clay.”

              The son of a bitch was still the enemy. Then just for grins, Rusty gave him a look. And if looks could kill, Jeffery Starr would have been a dead man.