The Redneck Detective Agency (The Redneck Detective Agency Mystery Series Book 1) (20 page)

Chapter 42

They cruised back up the river with their flotilla in the same order.

              Rusty didn’t know why he kept following them. His good sense told him he should just break away from the flotilla and get Sammy on the cell.

              Come to think of it, he knew why he didn’t break away. He was scared to break away. If his suspicions were true, if he broke away, Al would come after him. The Boston Whaler would take him over. Al probably had a gun and would just blast him there like he had done Elmore Katfish King.

              Rusty suspected Al of murder. Al knew that. All that surveillance equipment and spy stuff. Rusty asking Al to get him that dope on District Attorney Starr--Rusty had practically invited Al to monitor Rusty’s own life. Al knew every move Rusty had made. Every step. Even getting the Winston County high school yearbook from Dolopia College President Vargas Preston.

              Conspiracy Theory stuff and government mind-control methods explained it all. The way Al had always treated him. Maybe he had wanted to recruit Rusty into some clandestine operations. Bring Rusty over to the dark side. Somehow, covertly, Al created a rapport, a bond, with Rusty. How else would Rusty know what Al was thinking? And Al sure as hell knew what Rusty was thinking.

              Al led them up the river and past the other bluffs. When they were almost straight across from Al’s cabin, Al stopped trolling and stayed in one spot. He waved them both to come over.

              Vivian taxied on up and cut her engine. Rusty did likewise and when he reached over to grab Vivian’s gunwale, Al was saying, “What do we have here?”

              “What is it, Al?” Vivian asked.

              “There’s a big empty space. Long opening about two feet under the water. There’s a mass. I’m not good at evaluating this machine yet, but it looks to be at least two times as big as the last one.”

              “Wow. That would put the catfish at seventy pounds. That would win the rodeo! Yeeha!”

              Vivian might be involved in a redneck activity. But she was no redneck. Her yeeha was unconvincing, not anything near a rebel yell.

              “Seventy pounds. That’s a big fish. Especially in dark, muddy water.” Al sounded the bottom with his cane pole. “And you got four feet of water here. That’s deep to be dragging a fighting cat through.”

              “What, Al?” Vivian asked. “We do all this training and I’m not going to go for the catfish I’ve been looking for?”

              “I’m just checking. It might get a little hairy here and I don’t want you to blame me.”

              “Oh, come on, Al. Let’s go for it! You do your job, I’ll do mine.”

              “That’s what I want to hear, honey,” Al said. “You guys rig your boats back up together and I’m going to see if I can check out this hole.”

              Rusty and Vivian clamped their boats back together. When they were putting the stern strut across, Rusty glanced over at Al. Al was a good twenty feet away and Al’s boat and Al’s back was to Rusty. He couldn’t tell much, but Al was leaning over the side and had his hands down in the water there up against the bank.

              Then it sounded like metal hitting Al’s boat. Al’s boat moved around. Maybe it was just the clamps hitting the sides of his own boat.

              Al pushed his boat back from the bank. He was checking out the bottom with the cane pole. He pointed to where he had just been.

              “Pull up there right against the bank. The hole is two feet under the water. I checked with my own hands,” Al said.

              Rusty stood at the stern of his boat. He put the bamboo pole over into the water, dug the end down into the muddy bottom and shoved the end of the pole into the mud and then pushed the bows of the boat into the bank.

              “What do you think, Rusty?” Al asked.

              “Let me see your cane pole.”

              Al handed it to him. Rusty checked out the bottom from the bank to the stern of the boat.

              “Okay, Vivian. You want to be quick with this one,” Rusty said. “I don’t know if you’re going to have an air pocket in there. When you go in the hole, you feel for the fish, get a hold and then go fast. Pull him out. The first two feet, you have a slick clay bottom, like you are probably going to have in the hole. Get him out here past the hole two feet. Then you have a muddy bottom. You’ll be able to get a good footing and keep your head out of the water.”

              Vivian nodded her head.

              Al picked up his camera and aimed it at Vivian. Vivian jumped into the water between the two boats. The water was almost up to her breasts. She waded to the bank, turned and waved, took a deep breath and her head disappeared under the water.

              In a few seconds Rusty could see a cloud of muddy water--water that was muddier than the already muddy Elk--churn out of the bank at the hole. Then he thought he heard a faint thud from within. Then another cloud of muddy water.

              Then a wave of water came out. Whiteness. A figure. Vivian popped out of the water. She gasped for breath. She waded quickly toward the ladder and took a step up.

              Something was wrong.

              Rusty scrambled over and held his hand down for Vivian. She took it and he pulled her into the boat.

              Vivian was ghost white. Some of it was from being in the water, but it looked like all the blood had drained from her face. She had a muddy place on her head between her right temple and forehead. Then Rusty saw it was an abrasion.

              Vivian sat dumbfounded. Al put down the camera. “What’s the matter, Viv?”

              Rusty thought she was going into shock, but then she said, “It’s this monster. A shark. Something. It got my arm in its mouth. Wouldn’t let go. It spun me. It’s huge.”

              “Okay!” Al hollered. “We got us a big one. You take a breather there, Viv, and then go back in there and get that cat.”

              Vivian shook her head, frightened. “No, no, no. I’m not going back into that black hole.”

              Al kicked the side of the boat. Accidentally or on purpose, Rusty couldn’t tell. “Vivian, you go back in there and get that fish. I didn’t spend all this time training you. All this money for this equipment for you to chicken out.”

              Rusty took a step forward in his boat. “Let her…”

              “You don’t understand. That fish can eat me. That fish can drown me. It’s huge. It’s dark in there. There’s no air.”

              Vivian started to cry.

              Al looked up at the sky, gritted his teeth, and then looked back down. He changed his persona. “Okay, okay, okay, Vivian. This was just supposed to be fun. If you…” then he trailed off, choosing not say any more or not knowing what he was about to say.

              Just as Rusty thought she was going to start sobbing, Vivian stopped crying. She reached into a black garbage bag, came out with a towel and started drying herself off.

              Al and Rusty stood there in silence, looking toward Vivian. Vivian put her shirt back on and sat there huddled over like she was shivering cold in the hot, Alabama sun.

              “What about you, Rusty?” Al asked.

              “What about me, what?” Rusty asked. This whole episode was starting to give Rusty the willies. He needed to get away from Al. He needed to get to Sammy.

              “You ready to come out of retirement and grabble that big cat out of there?”

              “He’s Rusty,” Vivian said.

              Rusty looked at Vivian. She smiled. Only then did he get it. It was a pun.

              They all smiled to one another. Al seemed like his old self.

              “You’re the man of the hour,” Al said. “Rusty Rusty want to jump in the rusty water, go in the rusty hole and get the goddamn catfish that will probably win you five thousand dollars?”

              Rusty had forgotten about the prize money. Young Vivian might very well have been doing this for the money. Five thousand dollars was a lot of money for Rusty. It would probably be a fortune to a girl like Vivian. Now, come to think of it, it was the same amount Katfish King had given him.

              Rusty jumped down into the water. He wasn’t after the money. He wasn’t even after the challenge of the catfish. He just wanted to do whatever he had to do to gracefully get the hell away from Al Bolton in this moment in time.

Chapter 43

“I’ll give it a shot,” Rusty said. Vivian and Al clapped.

              Behind him at the transom of his boat was his father’s old tackle box. But today, unlike when he blew up the Yamaha, the tackle box did not hold his father’s .45 automatic Colt. Rusty got the tackle box, opened it and slipped the stuff out of his pockets and put in the box. Since Al was looking at him, he kept the recorder in his pocket.

              He took his shirt and hat off. Rusty jumped out of the boat and into chest deep water. It was warm. It was muddy. He couldn’t even see his own hands two feet down in the water.

              Two steps toward the bank and he had climbed up to waist deep water and then he went into a hole where the water was almost waist deep.

              Rusty took three deep breaths and then right before he went under the water, he heard Vivian say, “Be careful.”

              Before he could come up and see what kind of air pocket he had, Rusty hit the catfish.

              The catfish spun. The edge of a fin hit him on the forearm. He fell back against the clay and rock wall of the hole. The catfish stopped.

              Rusty felt for his head and there it was. He stuck his hand on the monster’s mouth and the catfish clamped down.

              Rusty planted his feet firm, squatted and tugged to pull him toward the hole, but Rusty’s foot hit a slick on the clay bottom section and he slipped. The catfish didn’t let go. The catfish spun. Rusty rolled with the cat. His head hit the wall. He put his other hand up on the catfish’s head and tried to pry his hand loose. The catfish wasn’t letting up.

              The thing was huge. One could never judge the size of a catfish in pitch, underwater darkness. They all seemed big monsters of unknown size. But this one was humongous.

              Rusty got his feet up under him and tried to stand. His head hit the top of the hole. Oh, my God, there was not enough air pocket at the top to raise his head out of the water to get a gasp of air.

              Rusty tugged and slipped. The cat spun again. It felt like it had yanked his right shoulder out of the socket.

              Rusty was running out of air. The damned catfish was going to drown him.

              He heard a muffled noise. Maybe it was Vivian screaming. Screaming at Al, for Al to come in to help pull him out.

              No, that was part of Al’s cat and mouse plan. To see if a catfish could drown Rusty Clay. If Al saved him he would wait, wait until Rusty was unconscious and drag him out and be the hero. That would fit into either plan. If Al just wanted to kill Rusty, it would tire him out, make him easier to control. Or if Al wanted mostly to mess with Rusty’s mind, it would put him into a tired state-of-mind, into gratitude, and thus submission. Al could implant his own agenda into Rusty’s psyche.

              Rusty was no Ray. Ray could stay underwater for three minutes. Not Rusty. Now, his lungs started to burn. The exertion sucked the oxygen out of him. He fought the compulsion--a crazy compulsion to breathe in a mouthful of warm, muddy Elk River water to try to fill his lungs. Keep my wits, Rusty said to himself.

              Rusty positioned himself alongside the catfish. He put his left arm around the cat right at the base of the cat’s head. The creature was way beyond huge. Rusty got a grip around the cat, hugged it with a tight hold. The cat started to roll. Rusty wrapped his left leg around the body of the cat.

              The Rusty Wrap. That’s what his daddy had called the move. It was the same move he had used at age ten to grabble a catfish greater than his own body weight.

              The catfish was one mad son of a bitch. He tried to roll and when he did, it gave him more leverage against the floor of the hole with his free leg. He planted his foot firmly, and with the use of the catfish’s own leverage, Rusty moved himself and the catfish out of the hole.

              Rusty popped up and got a breath of air. The sunlight seared his eyes. Rusty went back under, but before he did he saw Vivian begin to clap. Al had the camera trained on him.

              The catfish spun. Rusty used the motion to his advantage. Shoved on three more feet. Then Rusty’s free foot sunk into mud.

              It would be brute strength from here. Rusty let his wrap on the fish go, planted his feet into the mud. He manhandled the catfish over to the ladder.

              The catfish let his mouth grip go on Rusty’s hand. He actually tried to spit the hand out. Rusty’s hand slid out.

              He was going to lose the catfish. But did it matter now?

              What was he trying to do? Grabble a catfish into the boat or get the hell away from Al?

              Rusty shoved the catfish’s head over the gunwale of Vivian’s boat, which despite the catamaran type contraption, was now just a few inches above the water level. Vivian stood up and away from the catfish, careful not to assist.

              Rusty wrestled the body of the fish into the boat. The fish made a quick, strong side jack-knife reaction. Rusty lost his grip.

              But instead of flipping over Rusty’s shoulder back into the river, the catfish flipped himself right into the boat.

              Vivian started strapping the thing down.

              Rusty climbed into his own boat and looked over.

              Oh, my God. A catfish usually never looked bigger or seemed bigger than when you were grabbling it. But not now. The thing looked as big as a lopsided, full grown dolphin.

              After three deep breaths, Rusty let out the best cliché he could think of: “I’m getting too old for this shit.”

              He moved his arm in a rotating motion. He didn’t have full use of it. The catfish had pulled something in it. His left forearm had a cut down the length of it, but it wasn’t bleeding much. His back hurt.

              Rusty Clay had been beat up by a blue catfish.

              Vivian said, “Rusty, your arm is cut.”

              She grabbed the towel, took a step with calculated balance on the strut and stepped over into his boat. She started wiping around the cut. “We need to get some antiseptic on that. Maybe even some stitches.”

              We. She had used we. She had her right breast rubbing against him.

              Al took a good close-up of the fish. It was trying to flop out but the straps held him. It was so long that its tail extending well over the middle seat.

              Then Al glanced over. Rusty could see it, see how Al took a momentary note that Vivian was giving Rusty a little too much attention and sympathy.

              Al let the camera drop to arm’s length. He looked at Rusty.

              “You all right?”

              “Yeah, just a little shook up. I’ll be just fine in a minute.”

              “How much do you think it weighs?” Al asked.

              “Um.” Rusty put his shirt on and rolled the left sleeve up so it wouldn’t touch his cut. “I don’t know, Al. I’ve never seen a catfish that big.”

              Al looked back at the fish. “I couldn’t say either. If I had to guess I would say it weighed around two hundred and fourteen pounds.”

              Al had just shortened the distance of cat and mouse. Giving him the exact weight Katfish King had given Rusty. Make it plain as day that Al knew what Rusty knew. Al, in a figurative way, reeled in half the length of fishing line Al had Rusty on right now.

              “Let’s get the fish to the marina and officially weigh it in,” Al said.

              “I’m going to go home, put something on this cut, take a shower and put on some clean clothes,” Rusty said. “I’ll catch up with y’all there later.”

              “Wait, wait,” Al said. “We have to get a shot of you holding the paper with the fish.” Al got the newspaper out of the plastic bag and held it up.

              Vivian took the struts off the boats, so they were no longer connected. Al pulled his boat around and handed Rusty the newspaper.

              Rusty held the newspaper up. Al got it all on film. “Yes, folks, it looks like we have a new grabbling world’s record.”

              Vivian clapped. Al cut the camera off.

              Rusty reached back to crank his outboard. “Okay, guys. I’m out of here. See y’all at the marina.”

              “Naw, man. We all have to go together. You got to get the glory. We can’t take this thing in without you,” Al said.

              The charade was over. Ole Blue tipped the scales. Sure any huge blue catfish would be named Ole Blue, but it tipped the scales. Al didn’t intend him to leave his sight. Maybe he didn’t even intend for Rusty to arrive at the marina.