Jeff Abbott - Only Good Yankee

Billy Ray Bummel did for once look a little pained. Probably no one he’d tried to browbeat had threatened to call his mother on him-and if you’ve ever seen Mother Bummel, you know that’s not an idle threat.

“Excuse me, Mr. Bummel.” Lorna had finally decided to get involved in the fracas. “I don’t see what motive Mr. or Mrs. Goertz would have.

You know that Nina Hernandez loathed Greg. Why aren’t you off questioning her?” Billy Ray, repulsed by Hurricane Gretchen, turned his own bluster on Lorna. “It’s real easy to keep pointin’ fingers at Ms. Hernandez, when you’re the one who knew the deceased best. I’d like to know more about your relationship with Callahan, Miss Whychintzy.” “Wiercinski,” Lorna corrected. A nervous tongue darted out over her lips. “I don’t know what you mean about a relationship. I worked for Greg. He was my employer and that was it.” Know when someone you know intimately is lying? There’s that subtle shift in the air, like when the air-conditioning comes on in a house that’s been closed up too long. You can’t always tell when a loved one is lying right to your face (because you want to believe whatever garbage they’re feeding you), but it’s a damned sight easier to tell when they’re misleading some other fool. I caught my breath, sure that Lorna was fibbing. Billy Ray wasn’t deterred. “Mr. Blanton seemed to think that perhaps there was a bit more to it.” Lorna iced. “Mr.

Blanton is mistaken.” She glanced over at me. Her eyes played along my face. “Just what is the purpose of all this, Billy Ray?” I demanded.

“Are you just spending your time going around blindly accusing people of charges? How industrious of you.” “I’ve got to ascertain the facts of this case, Poteet,” Billy Ray answered, a sudden odd pleasantness in his tone. “I want to know just what Mr. Goertz, Mrs. Goertz, and Ms. Wiercinski know about this case, and I don’t intend to put up with interference from you.” His little eyes (they don’t need to be big because his brain can only handle limited information at any given moment) focused on me. “You knew the deceased as well. Care to comment on that?” “I met him once, last night, very briefly. He never called me or contacted me about my land. He was letting Lorna handle that.”

“Did you think he and your ex-girlfriend were having an affair?” “Good Lord, of course not,” I stormed. Would I have cared? I wasn’t sure. I wondered if the sudden pang in my stomach was what Lorna had felt when she’d learned about Candace and me. “So you say.” Billy Ray smirked again. “But I already know what kind of temper you have, Poteet.”

“Junebug, put him on a leash,” I said. “I’m not going to have him come into my home and make totally unfounded accusations against my friend and my”-I nearly said father, but some internal editor cut me off-“other friend.” I tried not to look at Bob Don. I didn’t want him to think I was ashamed of him, but I also didn’t want to share my paternity with a trashmouth like Bummel. “I told you, I wasn’t having an affair with Greg.” Lorna shot me a look. “Is this what your judicial system is like down here? They’ll never catch Greg’s killer.”

“Come along, Billy Ray,” Junebug said with a touch of resignation and infinite patience as our assistant D.A. began to bristle. “Let’s go talk with Miss Twyla and her houseguest.” He nodded at Sergeant Garza.

“Jordy, would you ride over there with us and answer some questions for Sergeant Garza?” “Sure, as long as I don’t have to listen to Billy Ray’s exercises in fiction,” I said. Bob Don and Gretchen quickly said that they had to be going, Lorna looked lost, and Sister stared at me with her arms crossed. I sighed and headed out the door. Being interrogated by Teresa Garza was a sight nicer than being questioned by Billy Ray Bummel. First, Teresa Garza acted like she knew what she was doing. Second, she was polite. Third, she didn’t conjecture-she just asked. Finally, she had a soothing voice. On the drive over to Miss Twyla’s house, I answered Sergeant Garza’s questions as best I could. Sitting in the back of Junebug’s cruiser with her (and Billy Ray up in the front, being unusually quiet), I provided as many details as I could muster. “You’re the only person that’s actually witnessed an explosion,” she told me. “No one saw Mr. Boolfors’s shed or Mrs. Tepper’s doghouse blow up.” She made me go over the details of what each blast looked like, the pop of the mailbox, the flash of light, and the concussive noise that trumpeted the detonation. She gently touched my sling. “You’re very lucky, Jordy. If you had been by one of those mailboxes, you could have been more seriously injured or even killed.” Billy Ray coughed. “I know. If Candace hadn’t pulled me inside when I fell, I would have gotten a back load of shrapnel.” I paused. “What kind of person does this, ma’am? Why would they blow up mailboxes on Candace’s street?” A cold thought touched me. “Could someone on that street have been a target?” Garza shook her head. Her hair was cut professionally short and mousse stiffened it into immobility. “I doubt it, although it’s hard to say. But this has all the classical marks of a prankster. The explosives are homemade, are put in places that don’t have high traffic, and are set off when people generally aren’t about-although this last incident certainly came close to violating the pattern.” She frowned. “That bothers me.”

“Where would someone get explosives around here?” Junebug cleared his throat. “Parker Loudermilk’s a partner in that construction company over in Bavary. He knows all about explosives,” he observed quietly as he turned into Miss Twyla’s driveway. This charge against authority was too much for an eggsucker like Billy Ray. “Chief Moncrief, I’m shocked. And the mayor being your boss! Why, I ought to-” “It was just an observation, Billy Ray,” Junebug said innocently. Made me wonder if perhaps Junebug wasn’t going to seek higher office next election. To my great annoyance, I was not invited in to see Billy Ray grill Nina Hernandez. Junebug handed me over to Sergeant Garza, and I walked with her, examining where the exploded mailboxes had stood. Garza told me the blackened posts of wood and twisted metal had been sent to her office in Austin for analysis. A total of six had exploded. “Isn’t blowing up mailboxes a federal offense?” I asked. “If they blew up post office property, yes,” she answered. “But I don’t think we’ll have to get the FBI involved yet. My worry is that no one in Mirabeau is turning up as having purchased explosives.” “You can check that?”

Garza nodded. “Yes, the ATF has all the records of explosives purchased in the country. They’ve been running the names of everyone in Mirabeau through our systems, and the only ones that have been coming out are people with legitimate commercial reasons-like Mr.

Loudermilk-for having explosives. We’re checking them out, but none of them seem to be good suspects.” “I still can’t believe this is happening in Mirabeau.” She shook her head. “Most small towns never have to deal with this kind of activity. For that matter, neither do most big cities.” She pointed at where Candace’s mailbox had stood.

“Blasting cap, I think, with a battery attached and definitely with a timer. From your description, someone wanted them to go off in a row, like firecrackers. You’re lucky it wasn’t one of the pipe bombs. Our boy’s been packing those with potassium chlorate, sugar, and powdered aluminum. That would have taken your head off.” I was only half listening; instead, I was staring at Candace’s shrapneled front door.

One windowpane had been broken and she hadn’t gotten it fixed yet. I thought she’d come out and see us, but then I remembered she was at the library. Doing my job while I was holding Lorna’s hand. I blew a long breath between my lips. What a mess. “No, Sergeant Garza, we don’t have to deal with explosives,” I said. “We just have to deal with the Billy Ray Bummels of the world.” “He is a piece of work,” she agreed politely. “I wonder-” I stared down Blossom Street at the six empty spots where mailboxes should have stood. “Wonder what?” “If there’s any connection between these… pranks and Greg Callahan’s death.” I squinted into the afternoon sun and rubbed my sore shoulder.