Margaret Maron - Bootlegger’s Daughter

Daddy and Dwight had their heads together talking fishing with Terry-“that sucker fought me all the way across the lake, heading for them root snags and-” Out on the dance floor, Reid had made up a square with Fitzi, Will, and Amy, and some others I didn’t recognize. Will looked as if he might’ve visited the beer keg a little more than he should’ve. Stevie still hadn’t located Gayle and was scanning the crowded floor for her.

L. V. Pruitt, Colleton County ’s coroner, had stepped up to the front of the platform to call the figures. A small spare man who normally spoke in hushed funereal tones, he had a lively inventive talent for spontaneous rhyme and could make himself heard above the fiddles: “Now you swing your partner out the back door, then you promenade all around the floor! Ladyfolks left and the gentlemen right; see who goes home with who tonight.”

Out beyond the circle of light, as many people were talking in tight clusters as were dancing.

“-like a drowned puppy that needed to be put out of its misery!”

“-so I said, well, if that’s the way the rest of the pulpit committee felt, I’d go along with their decision and just go home and pray on my own failings because-”

“-’cause the main thing to remember is that integration’s been a bigger success in the South than it could ever hope to be in the North and the reason-”

“Still didn’t find your mother?” I asked Faith Vickery, who was standing on tiptoes to see across the crowd.

She came down on her heels and looked at me blankly for a moment, almost as if she didn’t recognize me. “Oh. Deborah. No, and I’m concerned. She really isn’t well, you know. She really shouldn’t have come.”

“Why don’t I go look up at the house?” I offered. “Maybe she’s sitting with some of the older women on the porch.”

“No, I already looked there.”

Some of Faith’s concern began to transfer itself to me. What if she’d stumbled and fallen out here in the dark? “Do you want me to stop the music and ask if anyone’s seen her?”

Faith looked undecided. “You know how Mother is,” she said. “If she’s just off in a quiet corner somewhere in conversation with a friend, she’ll be so annoyed at me for making a fuss.”

It occurred to me that perhaps she might have been too overwhelmed by too many sympathetic well-wishers and had gone on back to the car to wait for Faith.

“I’ll bet that’s it!” Faith exclaimed. “I’ll go right now and check and if she’s there, I’ll just take her on home. Please thank your brothers for inviting us.”

She cut across the side yard and headed for the part of the pasture where she’d parked.

Up by the house, where the pasture gate actually entered the lane, a departing guest struggled to maneuver a car into the lane without scraping any of those parked on either side. As I neared the gate, I realized it was Gayle behind the steering wheel of an elderly Mercedes. She seemed to be having difficulty driving the large car.

“Gayle?” I called.

She didn’t hear, and as I hurried over, I saw Mrs. Vickery on the seat beside her. I thumped on the window, and when Gayle rolled it down after a quick glance at Mrs. Vickery, I bent down to look inside.

“Faith’s been looking for you everywhere, Mrs. Vickery.”

“I’m afraid I’m not feeling at all well,” she said, “and Gayle has kindly agreed to drive me home.” She sat erectly in the passenger seat with her large purse in her lap. Her left hand was on top of the shapeless purse, her right hand was inside it, and I felt as if I were looking at a copperhead moccasin.

“But Faith-”

“I’m quite sorry,” Mrs. Vickery said politely, “but we truly must go now.”

“Then why not let me drive you?” I said. “Gayle’s father’s looking for her, and anyhow, I’m more familiar with a straight drive than Gayle is.”

“You mustn’t leave your guests, Miss Knott. I’m sure she can manage. Drive on, Gayle.”

Helplessly, Gayle shifted into first and lurched slowly down the lane.

Equally helpless, I looked around and saw no one but the child who must have delivered Mrs. Vickery’s message that had lured Gayle out to her car.

“Melissa, listen!” I said as I ran back to my own car, pulled my revolver from the trunk, and slipped it in the pocket of my jacket. “Do you know Dwight Bryant?”

Large-eyed at the sight of my gun, she shook her head.

“Okay, then, run find Granddaddy or Uncle Seth and tell them Mrs. Vickery’s trying to hurt Gayle and that I’ve gone after them to make her stop. Scoot!”

She darted off and I jumped in the car just as Faith Vickery came though the pasture gate, looking frantic. “Mama’s car’s gone.”

I flung open the door and cried, “Get in! She’s got Gayle Whitehead.”

Faith hesitated and I revved the motor. “Dammit, either get in or get out of my way!”

Quickly, she hurried around to the side and half-fell in as I’d already started moving.

“Your mother’s flipped out, hasn’t she?” I said.

No answer.

“She’s holding a gun on Gayle. Why?”

Faith let out a half-strangled sob.

“Why?”

“Because she thinks Michael would still be alive if Gayle hadn’t asked you to look into her mother’s death.”

In the distance, red taillights glowed briefly, then turned right toward Cotton Grove. I hadn’t yet turned on my lights because I could have driven the lane blindfolded.

As the ramifications of what she’d said sunk in, I was seized with horror. “Your mother shot Michael!”

“No!” Faith cried.

“And Denn, too? Oh God, I told Denn that first blast was meant for him and it was! Michael was in Denn’s car, sitting where she expected to find Denn.”

Faith had begun to cry with low hopeless sobs. “No, no, no,” she moaned.

I barely heard, for I was trying to remember what Daddy had said about Mrs. Vickery when she was a teenager and used to come out to the old Dancy place with her brother to go hunting. Of course, she’d know how to handle guns. Any guns.

“Denn and Michael were splitting up, and Denn grabbed Janie’s slicker to give me that night,” I said aloud, working it out as I spoke. “When Michael realized, he must have called your mother. Why? Unless-yes! She must have known. He must have told her all those years ago. He probably blamed her for Janie’s death, since he’d tried to be straight to please her. That’s what Denn said: he’d tried to deny his own nature and look what happened. That’s why she held her head high when he brought Denn down here. He didn’t give her any choice, did he? What’d he do, say let me be gay or I’ll tell the world I’m a killer?”

Faith was still into heavy denial. Ahead, the taillights had reached the stop sign at Old Forty-Eight and turned left. I let two cars go by, then finally put on my lights and pulled onto the highway. Maybe the normal Saturday night traffic would keep her from noticing me.

“My nieces and nephews were out watching the town the night Michael was killed,” I told Faith. “They kept logs, too. If she was out in that Mercedes, one of them may well remember seeing her.”

“She always adored Michael,” Faith said dully. “He was the Prince of Light for her. It nearly killed her when she learned he was gay. I could never understand how she could be so-so accepting. And all these years, she’s loathed Denn McCloy. I never realized till after my brother’s wake. She made me go invite him to the funeral home. I was so proud of her for that. And all the time-” She broke off and fumbled in her purse until she found a tissue. “We were exhausted when we came home that night. Everyone fell into bed. But I couldn’t sleep. I got up and went downstairs around midnight for a book. A few minutes later, I heard the garage door open and her car drive in. I slipped to the side door, opened it just wide enough to see her take the shotgun out of the car and hide it up on the garage rafters. I was so frightened. And then the next morning when we heard-When I saw her eyes-”