Bill Crider: Shotgun Saturday Night

Bert was pointing when Rhodes walked up. “Right out in the open,” Bert said.

“Hard to figure,” Rhodes said, and it was. Though the foliage on the brush was scanty, the boxes could have been hidden easily if a little effort had been expended.

“Maybe they was in a hurry,” Bert said.

“Maybe,” Rhodes said. He was looking around in the white sand for tire tracks, though Bert had already driven over the road twice and Rhodes himself once. The sand was so dry and fine, however, that even the recent tracks had left no clear impressions.

“Well, I guess I might as well get to it,” Rhodes said.

“I’ll just stand over here if you don’t need my help,” Bert said. “I’ve looked in enough boxes to suit me already.”

Rhodes didn’t say anything. He reached in the right-hand pocket of his pants and took out his little Schrade-Walden knife and opened the blade. It wasn’t a pig-sticker, but it was sharp enough to do the job. He walked over to one of the sealed boxes and slit the tape.

Inside were more body parts, carefully wrapped in plastic. Arms and legs.

Being careful not to touch the box with his hands, Rhodes used the tip of the knife blade to close the flaps. Then he stepped over to the third box and slit the tape. The flaps raised slightly, and he flipped them up with the knife blade. Arms and legs.

“I don’t know what’s happened here, Bert,” Rhodes said, “but I can see that something’s missing.”

“I don’t care about lookin’,” Ramsey said.

“I don’t blame you,” Rhodes said. He pushed the box lid down with the knife. “I am going to have to ask you to help me, though. These boxes are evidence, just as much as what’s in them. If you don’t mind it too much, maybe we could load them in your truck and you could take them back to town for me.”

“I guess I could do that,” Bert said. “After all, I been haulin’ parts around for a while already.” He walked over to his truck, got in, and backed it up near the pile of brush.

When he got out, Rhodes said, “Just kind of grab the boxes by the edges. Try not to handle them too much.”

Bert lowered the tailgate of the S-10. “I get it,” he said. “Fingerprints.”

“I doubt it,” Rhodes said, “but it’s a possibility.” They set the boxes on the tailgate and then slide them to the front of the bed near the cab.

“Where you plannin’ to take these things?” Bert asked.

“Good question. I think we’ll take them to Ballinger’s. Clyde ought to know what to do with them if anybody does.” Clyde Ballinger owned Clearview’s oldest funeral home. In the course of his job, Rhodes had gotten to know him fairly well.

“Good idea,” Ramsey said. “I’ll meet you in the back.”

Ballinger’s Funeral Home had once been the home of one of Clearview’s wealthiest citizens, and it was located on one of the town’s main streets, conveniently near both a large Baptist church and the town’s only hospital. Its immaculate grounds, shaded by huge oak trees, had once held Clearview’s only private swimming pool and tennis courts. The pool had long since been filled in, and the tennis courts had been replaced with lawn grass.

The building itself was an impressive affair of red brick with a semicircular walk in front and large, white columns running the length of its fifty-foot porch. A side street led to the driveway, which in turn led to the rear entrance, the one through which most of Clyde Ballinger’s clients, as he preferred to think of them, were admitted to his place of business.

Behind the main building was a much smaller house, also of brick, which had once served as servants’ quarters. Now it was Ballinger’s private office and retreat, a place where not just anyone was allowed to enter. Rhodes was one of the privileged ones, however, and he was there to explain to Ballinger about the three boxes sitting in the driveway.

“As you can see, Clyde,” Rhodes was saying, “I’ve got a little problem here.”

“Little’s not the word I’d use,” Ballinger said. His voice boomed in the small living room where the two men sat. Everything Ballinger said was loud, except when he was engaged in the practice of his trade. He was, in fact, a very unlikely funeral director, or at least unlikely to anyone who thought morticians wore black suits and gloomy looks. Ballinger was short, fat, and dapper. He knew all the latest jokes, and he never wore black except to funerals.

“In fact,” Ballinger said, “it looks to me like you got something that would even give the boys at the 87th a bad time.”

Rhodes looked around the office at the bookshelves that lined three walls. They were filled with paperback books. Ballinger was an inveterate garage-sale shopper, and he bought nearly any crime-related paperback that he could find. One shelf was filled with old books by authors Rhodes had never heard of-Harry Whittington, Charles Williams, Jim Thompson, Gil Brewer. Another was devoted to John D. MacDonald and the 87th Precinct stories of Ed McBain. Rhodes had read a few of the latter, though he usually stuck to Louis L’Amour.

“I don’t know, Clyde,” Rhodes said. “Seems like crime stories in books are a lot worse than the real thing.”

“Aw, come on,” Ballinger said. “Parts of bodies dumped in a brush pile? Three boxes of parts? Hell, Sheriff, that’s like something the Deaf Man would come up with. I remember one time-”

“Not now, Clyde,” Rhodes said, cutting him off. He knew that if Ballinger got started telling about one of his favorite plots, they’d be there all day. “What I need right now is a place to store those boxes. And I need for you to keep quiet about what’s in them.”

Ballinger was clearly a little put out at not getting to tell his story, but he wasn’t one to hold a grudge. “All right, Sheriff. All right. I got a nice cool place where you can put those things. But it’s asking a lot to ask me to keep quiet about them. What am I going to tell Tom?”

Tom Skelly was Ballinger’s partner, the one who did a lot of the actual work. Clyde was more or less the public relations side of the business. “You can tell Tom,” Rhodes said. “But no one else. If this gets out, we’ll have the biggest scare this county ever saw. It’ll be like they were filming The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and everybody believed it was for real.”

“I guess I can keep it quiet,” Ballinger said. “You’d be surprised at the things I’ve had to hush up in this place. I remember the time that Old Lady Piikston died-”

“Don’t tell me,” Rhodes said. “Remember, you hushed it up.”

“Right,” Ballinger said.

“I’ll be sending someone over here later to fingerprint those boxes,” Rhodes said.

“I’ll tell Tom,” Ballinger said. “I guess you want to move them into storage personally.”

“That’s right,” Rhodes said.

“Well, let’s get on with it.” Ballinger stood up. “Did I ever tell you about that Jim Thompson book with the deputy sheriff in it? He’s a psychotic killer, see-”

“Yeah, I think you told me about that one,” said Rhodes, who had had some trouble with a deputy of his own fairly recently.

“It’s a good one,” Ballinger said as they went out the office door.

After a hamburger and a Dr. Pepper at the Blue Bonnet café, Rhodes drove back to the jail. The arm was still on his desk.

“I’ve got to take that thing over to Ballinger’s,” he told Hack. “Any trouble while I was out?”

“Miz Thurman called,” Hack said.

Rhodes waited. Hack told things at his own rate and in his own way. There was no need to rush him. He worked for the county practically free, and he did a fine job. Rhodes was willing to put up with his approach to reporting on calls.