Миранда Джеймс - Claws For Concern

“I know who you are, Mr. Harris. Kanesha Berry has talked about you at the Mississippi Sheriffs’ Association meeting. I been knowing her for a few years. She speaks pretty highly of you.”

“I’m happy to hear that, Sheriff Johnson,” I said. “I would also like to thank you for talking with us this morning.”

Johnson nodded and moved back around his desk to resume his seat. He waved a hand to indicate that we should sit. Jack and I pulled chairs in front of the desk, and Diesel sat between us.

Johnson leaned back in his chair and regarded Jack. “So what is this all about, Jack? What have you got your nose stuck into this time?”

“The Barber case,” Jack said.

The sheriff’s eyes narrowed. “How come you got interested in that?”

“Perhaps I should explain,” I said. “I recently made the acquaintance of Bill Delaney.” I noticed that Johnson stiffened slightly at the mention of the name. He obviously recognized it immediately. “It turns out that his biological father was married to my late aunt. He apparently only found out who his father was when his mother, Sylvia Delaney, passed away recently.”

“Where is Delaney now?” Johnson asked.

“In the ICU in the Athena hospital.” I gave him a quick summary of the situation. “I haven’t had a chance to call the hospital to get an update since this morning when they told me he was still in stable condition. He’s in bad shape physically, though, so his long-term prognosis isn’t good.”

“Why are you so interested in the Barber case?” Johnson asked again.

“Because of Bill Delaney,” I replied. “I know he was suspected, but his mother gave him an alibi that no one could break.”

“That’s true,” Johnson said. “I was a young deputy at the time, and I worked on the case. His mama was a tough lady. Looked sweet as they come but tough. But again, why are you poking into this?”

How could I explain that I felt a responsibility toward Delaney because of my aunt? I wasn’t sure whether Johnson would buy it. I settled for a simpler answer. “I need to know the truth because of his connection to my family.”

Johnson shrugged. “Okay. So are y’all here to ask me questions about the case? What’s going on?”

“We have information that could help break the case, once and for all,” Jack said. “We’re ready to give it to you, but we want something in return.”

“What information could you possibly have?” Johnson sounded skeptical.

“Information about an alibi,” Jack said.

Johnson stared hard at both of us, his eyes narrowed again.

Jack continued, “In return for that, we want to know the details of the autopsies.”

Johnson laughed. “You don’t want much, do you? Do you seriously think I’m going to give you information like that?”

Jack sounded confident when he replied. “If you want to hear what we found out, you will.”

They looked like two combatants about to engage. All I could do was sit there with my cat and wait to see who emerged victorious.

THIRTY

Evidently Elmer Lee Johnson’s curiosity won out over his desire to deny Jack the information we wanted to barter. “All right, Jack, I’ll let you see the autopsy report.” The sheriff leaned forward and put his elbows on his desk. “So what’s this big new information about an alibi? You talking about Bill Delaney?”

“Yes,” Jack said. “Charlie and I came from interviewing the Delaneys’ next-door neighbor, Mrs. Cooper, and her son, Ronnie. Do you know them?”

Johnson snorted. “Everybody in town knows Ronnie Cooper and that expensive car of his. What did he have to say?”

“Not anywhere near as much as his mother did. That woman sure can talk,” I said. “But what Ronnie told us will probably surprise you.” Diesel meowed, and Johnson looked startled. Then he grinned.

“I heard that cat acts like he knows what you say.” Johnson shook his head. “Next thing you know, he’ll be reading a book. Okay, now, what did Ronnie Cooper tell you?”

“He heard—and saw—Bill Delaney leave the house that night around ten and come back a little after midnight,” Jack said.

“He couldn’t’ve been more’n about seven or eight back then,” the sheriff said. “How can he remember that far back and know what he’s talking about?”

“He’s been keeping a notebook since around the time his father died, maybe a year before the Barber murders. He’s an impressive young man, I have to say.”

Jack took up the narrative. “He told us the Delaneys’ car had a distinctive whistle in the engine. His bedroom is the one next to the driveway for the Delaney house. Did you know that?”

Johnson shook his head. He was starting to look intrigued. “Go on.”

“The Coopers had a dog that would bark every time it heard the engine whistling,” I said. “The dog woke Ronnie up twice that night, and Ronnie recorded it all in his notebook. Jack, why don’t you show the sheriff the pages?”

Jack pulled the folded papers from his pocket and handed them across the desk. Johnson took them and unfolded them.

“Down toward the bottom of the first page,” I said.

Jack and I remained quiet while the sheriff read. When he finished, Johnson dropped the papers on his desk, slammed his fist on top of them, and uttered an obscenity. I flinched at it, but I understood his emotion.

“How the hell did we miss this twenty years ago?” Johnson shook his head. “Delaney was out of the house after all. His mama sure put on a good act, though. She swore up and down he was out of it all night, sleeping it off in his room.”

“He might have fooled her into thinking that,” I said. “Maybe Mrs. Delaney really thought he was in his room.”

Johnson shrugged. “Too late to ask her now, but I’m sure the hell going to talk to Delaney the minute he’s able.”

“Now do you understand why we want to look at the autopsy reports?” Jack asked.

Johnson glared at Jack. “Of course I do. Time of death. You want to know if the Barbers were killed during that window of time.”

“Exactly,” I said. “There was maybe a little more than an hour when Delaney could have killed the Barbers. If he had left the house another time, the Coopers’ dog would have alerted them. So the key time is between ten and midnight, minus the time it took him to go back and forth from home to the Barber farm.”

“Wait a minute,” Johnson said. “What time did Delaney get home the first time? I can’t remember what his mama said.”

“According to Mrs. Cooper,” Jack replied, “it was around seven. He was drunk all right, so drunk he couldn’t find his own house key. He was making all kinds of noise, beating on the door and yelling to be let in.”

“He couldn’t’ve been that drunk if he was going out again at ten o’clock, driving a car,” the sheriff said. “I saw him a few times when he was bad drunk. He’d conk out and the trumpets of Jericho couldn’t wake him up.”

That was an interesting point, one I hadn’t considered yet. What if Delaney pretended to be drunker than he was? Could that be an argument for premeditation?

“The autopsies,” Jack said, his rising impatience obvious. “Come on, Elmer Lee, we made a deal.”

“I know that,” the sheriff replied, sounding testy. “I can tell you what you want to know, though, about the time of death.” He paused. “About the times of death, that is.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. “Weren’t all four of them killed within a short span of time?”

Johnson shook his head. “From what we could tell at the time, it looked like they had been. We thought Barber was shot first, then his wife and the boys. Turned out that was all wrong.”