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I dont think I can carry it by myself, I said.
She pointed out the window at Cockroach, who was smoking in the yard. You want me to call him back and tell him you didnt do like I asked?
I thought about what he might do if she told him that. No mam, I said, I can do it. You dont need to call him. Ill be back for it as soon as I empty the trash.
Wash out that can real good after you empty it, she said.
The trash can was full of wet, smelly rags. When I dumped it, they slithered out and plopped on the ground, and slimy reddish brown liquid dribbled out of the bottom of the can. I couldnt help it, I bent over and puked right on top of the whole mess.
There was a water hose behind the infirmary, so I rinsed out the trash can and washed out my mouth and took a drink. I noticed stuff from the trash can spattered on my shoes, so I rinsed those, too, while I let the trash can drain. Then I took it back inside and went to get the mattress.
Mrs. Wilcox wasnt in the room, so I leaned down real quick and whispered to Buck, can you hear me? His eyes opened and he whispered yes. How bad are you hurt? Real bad, he said. I cant walk. I dont know if I can ever walk again. I squeezed his hand. Im sorry Buck. Ill pray for you.
Hes dead, Skeeter, said Buck. Jareds dead. They wrapped him up in a sheet and dragged him out of here by the feet. His head was dragging like a sack of rocks. I heard them say they were taking him to the bone yard.
Mrs. Wilcox was coming, so I let go of Bucks hand and grabbed the mattress real quick. I dragged it across the floor and out the door. When the corner bumped down the steps, I thought about Jareds head bumping that same way.
I pushed away my plate of catfish, which had grown cold as I’d read. I’d eaten only a few bites, and I noticed that Stu and Angie hadn’t done any better with their dinners than I’d done with mine. “Jesus,” Angie commented as she laid down the pages. “Welcome to hell.”
Vickery took out a fresh cigar, which he unwrapped slowly. Instead of chomping it, he rotated it between his fingers, studying first one end and then the other, as if the cigar might provide some answer to the age-old question of evil. “Hell,” he said, “would be too good a place for the guys who did this.”
Chapter 16
“Well, there’s good news and bad news,” Vickery said when he got out of his Jeep at the cemetery the next day.
Angie kept her eyes on the probe she was shoving into the ground at the foot of one of the pipe crosses. “What’s the bad news?”
“The bad news is, the governor doesn’t want us to disturb the graveyard.”
Now she looked up. “What the hell? I was hoping we could finish probing today, maybe get the forensic backhoe out here tomorrow. Why doesn’t he want us to dig it up?”
“He told the commissioner there’s no indication that anyone buried in these graves was the victim of a crime. Unless we find compelling evidence that links these graves to crimes, he says, it would be a desecration to disturb the cemetery.”
“Desecration? To find the truth? Give me a break.” She studied his face. “Do you think maybe he’s covering up something?”
“I doubt it.” He shrugged. “This looks like a bees’ nest, and I can see how the governor would rather we didn’t whack it with a stick and stir up the bees. If we start pulling bodies from the ground, lawyers are gonna be lining up to sue the state for millions. Besides, forensically, it’d be tough to identify the remains, wouldn’t it, Doc?”
“Probably,” I conceded. “Unless they’re in good coffins and watertight vaults, they’ll be down to bare bone. You might be able to get mitochondrial DNA out of the bones or teeth, but how much would that tell you? Mitochondrial DNA doesn’t give you a unique identification — it just tells you whether two individuals share a common female ancestor. Besides, who would you compare these boys’ DNA to?”
Angie looked inclined to argue with me, but Vickery didn’t give her the chance. “Look, the doc agrees that neither of the skulls came from here, so finding where the skulls did come from needs to be our top priority.”
“Well, I say let’s give the bees’ nest a good whack,” she said. “That seems like our job. I’m amazed it hasn’t gotten into the press yet. Disappointed, too.” She looked from the probe to the other crosses. “Maybe we’ll find something as we map it,” she said. “More graves than we’ve got markers. I don’t know. Hell, maybe a probe will snag on a murder weapon.”
Vickery shook his head. “The commissioner says to leave it alone. Says respect for the sanctity of a cemetery takes precedence. Photographs. That’s it, for the time being. We have to pull the plug, even on the probing.”
“Unbelievable,” she groaned.
“I’ve got people looking through the state archives and old newspaper stories,” he said. “I’m hoping Hatfield was wrong about all the records being lost in the fire. Maybe we’ll turn up something that lets us make a stronger case.” Angie shook her head angrily, and I wondered if some of that anger stemmed from her frustration about her sister, whose death had similarly fallen through the investigative cracks. “Don’t you want to hear the good news?” Angie looked skeptical. “Remember,” he said, “the cemetery’s not where the real action is.” He gave a canary-eating smile. “Our pal Deputy Sutton just phoned me. He got a call from Winston Pettis this morning. The dog’s brought home another bone.”
I felt my own face break into a smile. “Good boy, Jasper! Another skull?”
He shook his head. “Not this time. Sounds like a leg bone, maybe a femur. Long, with a big, round knob on one end.”
“Could be a femur,” I agreed, “but it could also be a humerus, an upper arm bone. And it might be animal. Horse, cow, deer. Maybe even panther or black bear; you have those down here, right?”
“A hundred years ago, yeah. Not in my lifetime.”
“You should spend more time in the crime lab,” Angie said. “I’ve had deputies bring me bear bones two or three times and swear they were human.”
“Actually, the bones of a bear’s paw look a lot like human foot bones,” I conceded.
“Yeah, well, I’ve also had deputies bring me goat bones and swear they were human.”
The idea that the bone might be animal seemed to take some of the wind out of Vickery’s sails, so I tried to steer the conversation back to a more encouraging course. “Well, Jasper seems to have a taste for humans,” I said, “and he appears to have found the mother lode.” A realization hit me. “Hey. If it is human, and if the GPS collar worked, then he’s just shown us where he found it, right?”
Vickery smiled around his cigar, his sails billowing. “Shall we go pay another visit to the Pettis mansion?”
Chapter 17
As we pulled into the clearing beside the secluded cabin, Vickery leading the way in his Jeep, I imagined the scene that had transpired in the predawn hours: the dog leaping onto the mattress in the darkness, circling a couple times as if to trample down grass, and then curling up proudly beside his owner with a ripe femur. I smiled as I pictured it.
On our prior two visits, Jasper had bounded out to greet us; I was surprised that he wasn’t racing to see us this time. I was disappointed, too, I noticed. “I guess Jasper’s gotten bored with us,” I sighed.
Angie gave the horn two quick toots as she stopped the Suburban — a friendly way to announce our arrival — and we all got out and headed up the rickety steps to the front porch. Vickery rapped on the screen door. “Mr. Pettis?” he called out. “Hello?” He waited a few beats, then opened the screen and crossed the porch. Angie and I followed, and I detoured to inspect the shelf that held Jasper’s bone collection, hoping to see the latest addition. Again I was disappointed.
Knocking on the cabin’s only door, which led into the kitchen, Vickery called out again. “Mr. Pettis, are you here?” No answer. He knocked again, hard; the two large panes of glass in the top half of the door, which were held in place by only a few remnants of brittle putty, rattled and threatened to tumble to the porch.
