Scott Pratt - An Innocent Client

The Purple Pig was a small, popular burger and beer joint about a mile from East Tennessee State University. It was like one of those English pubs-same people, sitting in the same places, telling the same old jokes, drinking the same kind of beer. Landers ate lunch there two or three times a month. Every now and then he’d stop in and have a beer after work. He went to high school with the owners, and he knew several of the regulars and the waitresses. Especially the waitresses. Landers had phone numbers for all of them, even the ones who were married. “Skilled with the ladies,” was how he referred to himself.

He parked his Ford in the lot, picked up the photo of Tester, and jogged up to the door. He could smell the grease as soon as he got out of the car. The Pig wasn’t open for breakfast, but there were cars in the lot. He knew the employees were prepping for the lunch rush, so he knocked on the locked front door. Patti Gillespie opened it. Patti was a cute little brunette, barely over five feet tall. She and her brother Sonny owned the place. Landers had banged a drunken Patti once in the girls bathroom during a basketball game back in high school. He’d wanted to know what a small girl felt like.

“I need to talk to you,” Landers said, and she led him inside. He plunked down on the first bar stool he came to. The place was dark and smelled of stale cigarette smoke and animal fat. A mirror ran the length of a long wall opposite the bar. Landers checked himself out as Patti walked around the bar and back toward him. He liked what he saw.

“What’s the difference between a sperm cell and a TBI agent?” she said. Patti loved to bust his chops.

“Go ahead, slay me,” Landers said. “What’s the difference between a sperm cell and a TBI agent?”

“A sperm cell has a one in a million chance of becoming a human being. Can I get you something to drink?”

“A Pepsi, and I have a photograph I want you to look at. Do you mind?”

“Are you doing real police work?”

“I am.”

“Hey, Lottie,” Patti called toward the kitchen. “Special Agent Phillip Landers here is doing real police work in my little old bar. He wants me to help him. What should I do?”

“Deny everything,” a voice called back. “Ask for a lawyer.”

“She doesn’t like you,” Patti said. “She says you have a small penis.”

“You know better than that,” Landers said with a wink.

“I was drunk, jerkoff. I don’t remember your penis.”

Landers slid the photo of Tester onto the bar. “Any chance this guy was in here yesterday evening?”

Patti nodded. “Came in about six, sat right over there in that booth.” She pointed behind Landers. “I waited on him. Ordered a cheeseburger and fries. Drank two Blue Ribbons. Nobody drinks Blue Ribbon any more. I remember thinking he wouldn’t have looked too bad if he lost some weight and shaved those goofy sideburns.”

“I don’t think he’ll be shaving any time soon. He’s dead.”

Patti gasped. “You kidding me?”

“Dead as dirt. Got himself killed last night. Any chance he hooked up with somebody in here? Did you see him leave?”

“Sonny was working the register when he left. He didn’t leave with anybody, but he asked Sonny about the Mouse’s Tail.”

“Really? Tell me more.”

“He was a little creepy, you know? A little too cocky for his own good with that big belly and that cheap suit. When he paid his bill he asked Sonny where he could find some adult entertainment, a place where they showed it all. Sonny told me about it after he left. He thought it was funny. He said the only way that dude would get any was to pay for it.”

“Mouse’s Tail, huh? Thanks, Patti. After all these years, I’m finally gonna put you on my Christmas card list.”

“Whoa, now, wait just one minute,” Patti said. “I need details. Tell me something juicy.”

“Sorry, can’t do it right now. I’m sure you’ll hear all about it on the news.”

“Just like a man. Always wanting something for nothing.”

Landers turned to leave without offering to pay. “Thanks for the Pepsi,” he said, “and thanks for the information. I’ll come back and tell you about it later.”

“I’m holding you to that,” she said. Landers looked in the mirror as he started out the door and saw Patti blow him a kiss. “That man has a fine butt, Lottie,” he heard her say.

“Screw him,” Lottie said. “He’s a fag.”

Lottie was pretty good, but once Landers did her a few times, he dumped her. He had to. There were a lot of other women out there who wanted to be with him. He figured he owed it to all of them to stay unattached.

April 12

11:45 a.m.

A horny preacher. A man after Landers’s own heart.

Landers called Jimmy Brown, told him about the lead and that he was going out to the Mouse’s Tail. Brown said they’d found one witness, the night clerk at the motel, who said she thought she saw a woman go up toward Tester’s room around midnight. The forensics van had showed up. Maybe they’d find something.

Brown said Tester was an evangelist, a traveling preacher from Newport, which was located in Cocke County about sixty miles to the southwest of Johnson City. Newport was infamous in the law enforcement community for three things: chop shops, marijuana production, and especially cock fighting. Landers had also heard some of the preachers down there were snake-handlers, religious extremists who proved their faith by waving copperheads and rattlesnakes around while they delivered their sermons. He wondered whether the dead rev liked to play with slimy serpents.

He pulled into the parking lot at the Mouse’s Tail just before noon and circled the building. There was only one vehicle in the back, a black BMW convertible. A redheaded woman was just getting out. She was wearing black leather pants and a tight cheetah print top and was having a hard time walking through the gravel in her three-inch spiked heels. The outfit was definitely on the outrageous side, but her body was good enough to pull it off.

Landers pulled up beside the BMW, got out, introduced himself, and showed the woman his identification. She shook his hand and said her name was Erlene Barlowe. She owned the place. Said her husband passed away a while back and she took over after he died. She had a pretty face and was wearing a push-up bra that pushed up plenty. But she had to be at least fifty, so Landers figured the bright red hair was bottle-fed.

“What can I do for you, honey?” she said after a little small talk.

“What time do you open?” Landers was disappointed that the place was closed, since he wanted to talk to some of the employees. Actually, he was hoping to get to see some of her employees in action. He’d heard the Mouse’s Tail was a pretty steamy place, but he’d never been in there. When Landers wanted to go to a strip club, he went to Myrtle Beach or Atlanta. As much as he liked to look at live, naked women, he knew the TBI would probably fire him if they heard he was hanging out at the local titty bar. Those kinds of places were notorious for drugs.

“Five,” the woman said. “We’re open five to two, six days a week. Closed on Sundays.” Her voice was kind of southern belleish, not exactly what he expected to hear from a woman who looked like her, with a syrupy Tennessee drawl. Landers thought it was nice that the titty bar observed the Sabbath.

“So you were open last night?”

“Wednesday’s usually a pretty good night for us. It’s hump day, you know.”

She had a little smile on her face when she said “hump day.” Landers wondered how much humping went on in there on hump day.

“Was it crowded last night?”

“Wasn’t anything special, sugar. Do you mind if I ask why you’re asking?”