Нельсон Демилль - The Best American Mystery Stories 2004

Tyree stared at her.

As if patiently explaining the obvious to a halfwit, Amy finished, “You saw our town’s population numbers if you was at the Mobil. You know how in each other’s pockets neighbors get in a place this size? Nothin’ else to do.” She held up her hands as if to say, Well duh!

She finished, “So who you after?”

He stared at her father, who just shrugged, then her mother. Lydia sat quietly, sipping her coffee.

Tyree squirmed, which is what he suspected Amy had intended him to do. “What’s with the jump in population, then? From 112 to 427 in the last year. Or did I read it wrong?”

David Bearclaw nodded, his mouth screwed tight as if suppressing anger. “You read right. The hotel. Sells plots now, fancy houses all squashed together like fleas, in sections tucked between the three golf courses they got. Word is they’re building another golf course just for the residents. Pools, all that.”

Tyree asked, “Vacation homes or permanent?”

David eyed him. “What’s the difference?”

“Permanent means schools,” said Tyree. “Post offices, restaurants, sewers, service roads. And eventually some type of industry to employ them. Lotta extras come with permanent residents. Money for the Hollow, though.” He lifted an eyebrow in question.

David shook his head. “Don’t need, don’t want that kind of prosperity.”

Tyree frowned. “You got no police at all?”

Amy grinned. “Didn’t say that. We got Kizzy.”

David said quietly, “My mother. One of the remaining full-blooded Cherokees from the Trail of Tears. Descended from those who hid so the soldiers missed them in the roundup.”

Tyree considered. “Didn’t I read that about a third of the Indians force-marched to the reservations out West died on the trail?”

David nodded, looked aside.

Amy grunted. “That’s why the name, Trail of Tears.”

Tyree folded his arms, said to David, “So your ma, Amy’s grandma, is the law here?”

Lydia smiled.

Amy grinned. “She’s a Wise Woman. She sees and knows it all. Nobody can get away with a dang thing. She nails somebody, they’re nailed for good. Who needs a pushy cop shooting up innocent bystanders? She’s teaching me to take her place someday. She can’t die until I take over from her.”

Tyree slid his eyes sideways to examine the half-pint-size girl so smug, so big for such a pixie. Tried to keep the flummoxed look off his face. He finally sighed. “I believe you. You asked about my mark: Don’t know his name. I know what used to be his name. Edgar Fallon.”

Silence.

“What’d he do?” rumbled David Bearclaw at last. “In Chicago, was it?”

“Oh, Dad. Drugs and heatin’ up women, you can guess that much.”

Tyree lilted his hands. “Holy shit. You sure Captain Sabinski didn’t just mail you the guy’s jacket?”

Lydia Bearclaw smiled. “It’s hard to get used to, I know. Like jungle drums. Kizzy is a... a natural force, like a tornado. Amy, too. She’s just not as disciplined or schooled. Yet.”

“And where’d you come from?” Tyree asked. “The Upper East Side of Manhattan?”

“Very good,” she said, still smiling.

He thought a minute. “So you were running, too, when you got here. From what?” He studied her, brow furrowed in thought. “Were you blind before you got here? From birth? Or from—”

“Not nice, Mr. Tyree,” said Lydia Bearclaw. “Mind your manners. I know you have some. And I know you’re used to minding them, because you’ve restrained yourself amazingly ever since you arrived in Rushing River.”

Tyree nodded. “You read me right. Sorry, ma’am. Sir,” he said to her husband, who just faintly smiled and shrugged. Not a talker, thought Tyree.

“So now what?” he said, more to himself than to his hosts.

“Tell us the whole thing,” insisted Amy. “I don’t get the twenty years ago part.”

Tyree looked at her ruefully. “Twenty- four years ago, to be exact. This kid lied about his age — he was seventeen then — so he could marry a twenty-year-old dumb Polack girl in Chicago. He’d knocked — he’d gotten her pregnant. Too innocent, no family. A pretty blonde. So she works hard in a local diner while he’s supposedly driving a cab, and she thinks they’re socking away every penny so they can escape the projects with their baby, but he’s depositing it all into his veins. But she trusts him. The sweet little girl has her beautiful baby boy, goes right back to work. He switches to nights to watch the kid during the day. Next thing she knows, stuff starts missing from the apartment. See, his addiction’s growing beyond their joint income. So she reports the thefts to the precinct, but they’re all petty. I mean, what do they have to steal? The local beat cop, after one look at the husband, guesses the truth, tries to tell her, but she won’t listen. Until one day she catches hubby snitching her paycheck from her purse. Big fight, lots of screaming, and then silence. Some hours pass, but the silence bothers one neighbor who really cares about the poor girl, who finally decides to check on her. He pushes open the door, finds the girl in the kitchen, bloody and out cold on the floor next to her baby. Baby’s head is smashed flat on one side. The woman’s physically OK. The blood is all the baby’s.”

“Jesus wept,” murmured David Bearclaw.

“The cops went for the husband at his place of work, found out he’d been fired a few weeks before. His former dispatcher confirmed Eddie was supporting a monster habit and unable to hold a job. He had to be getting desperate for cash. Dealers don’t extend credit.” His mouth twisted wryly. “Cops figured, with nerves raggedy from too long off the juice, his wife catching him in his theft — screaming wife, screaming baby — he popped. Then either he slam-dunked the child to shut it up, an accidental murder, or he just flat murdered it. Luckily a chop to his wife’s head knocked her cold, or the cops figured she’d be dead, too. No Eddie. And when she woke up, she’d lost herself. Catatonic.”

Mrs. Bearclaw asked gently, “That makes it twenty-three years ago, then. So why are you here? And why now?”

“Because after twenty-three years of institutionalization, therapy, and whatever they do to help poor souls like that sweet girl — woman now — she regained her mind and memory. The doctors say she not only recovered, although still frail, but can be believed. And she told what happened. The cops had the story nailed pretty much correctly.”

“But you’re no cop,” said Amy. “Doesn’t sound like there’s a bounty on the guy. Why are you here?”

Tyree sighed. “’Cause I had the misfortune of going through elementary, then junior high, then high school with a good buddy who’s now Captain Lee Sabinski of Homicide in Chicago. And over the years, he’s kept track of our running balance of favors. I owe him big right now, and bounty hunters don’t suffer from a need for search warrants, extradition paperwork, and that stuff.” He looked Amy in the eye, man to man, so to speak. His sharp cheekbones bunched up into his own grin. “Plus, I’m good at my job. The cops had nothing then, and Sabinski’s men found the same nothing now. They aren’t even sure he ever left Illinois. But I work with a rather special computer information expert — a genius in his own way. Probably should meet your Grandma Kizzy. He decided to start with Eddie’s car. Even if he ditched it fast, in that first flight away from his own house, we figure he used his own car. In the projects, he was one of the few who had a car.

“So my man patiently traced from car to car to car, all but a few of them stolen, natch, but the ones that he didn’t steal: he changed his name just a little with each transaction. And two patterns emerged: a trail that never went beyond West Virginia, and a name that by now we figure might somewhat resemble Roy Barso.”