Joe Lansdale - Devil Red

“So, you were just minding your own business,” Brett said.

“Really,” Leonard said. “We were.”

“I believe you,” she said. “I’m on your side.”

“We’re the three musketeers,” I said. “Oh,” I said, looking at Marvin, “sorry to leave you out of the musketeer thing. In the book, there were actually four.”

“I don’t want to be a musketeer,” Marvin said.

“Now, come on,” Leonard said. “He didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. You can be a musketeer too.”

“I’m fine,” Marvin said.

“My sense of things,” Leonard said, “is that you really do want to be one, and just won’t admit it.”

“Actually,” Brett said, “I always wanted to be a Mouseketeer.”

“Oh, Christ,” I said, “is there any way some night I can get you to wear a set of mouse ears when we, you know-”

“Oh, hell yeah,” Brett said.

Brett went into the kitchen, came back with some corn chips and sodas, said, “Enjoy, this may be as housewifey as I get.”

We had at the chips and drinks. It was like a feeding frenzy at the zoo.

“So, the deal is,” Brett said, “you’re trying to find the connection between the vampires and the man in the trailer, Mini’s stepdad? And you’re thinking Mini’s money is part of the deal?”

“It makes sense,” Marvin said. “And I can tell Hap has kept our confidential rule and not mentioned any of this to you.”

“Oh, he never shuts up,” Brett said.

“Figured as much,” Marvin said.

“Want to hear what I think?”

“Might as well.”

“Maybe I should wear Leonard’s deerstalker since I’m giving my valued investigative opinion based on nothing but a hunch.” Leonard handed it to her and she put it on.

“Whoa,” Marvin said. “That looks good on you.”

“Hell, yeah,” I said. “Forget the mouse ears.”

“It looks all right,” Leonard said.

“The money is all coincidence,” Brett said. “It’s clouding your judgment. The law got Godzilla for the murder of that frat boy, but Mini, she got off the hook, and so did the others. They got their wrists slapped. Somewhere, someone’s bound to be mad about that, and it doesn’t have to do with them being vampires, or there being money involved, or even Ted Christopher being killed. With me so far?”

“We’re listening,” Marvin said.

“Wouldn’t you be mad someone killed someone you loved, and the batch of them got off by tattling?” Brett said.

“They got off because they turned evidence on Godzilla, who did the actual killing,” Marvin said. “She was the one stabbed the kid, sucked his blood. I’m not saying they’re pure as the driven snow, but they didn’t do the stabbing.”

“I know,” Brett said, “but if someone killed Hap, I wouldn’t be satisfied if the one person most responsible went to jail and didn’t even get the death penalty. That deal would suck, especially since the others got to go free and weren’t even told their breath stinks. If I was the frat boy’s family, maybe I would have a serious grudge. Now that I think about it, I’ve never heard any of you even mention the dead boy’s name.”

We looked at one another.

“I guess we been thinking it had more to do with Godzilla or Mini or Ted,” I said.

“You got your notes, Hap?” Marvin asked.

I got them.

Marvin opened them. “Kid’s name was Jason Kincaid. His parents are divorced, and the mother is dead. Cancer. The father is a sixty-year-old accountant in Houston. Had one other child, a girl, Florence, died of a drug overdose. Has some wealthy clients, and therefore is pretty wealthy himself. His name is Howard Kincaid. He was looked at by the cops some years ago. They came up with zip. He hasn’t been high on our list, because they caught the one who killed his kid. Godzilla.”

“Maybe Kincaid could get another look,” I said.

“It’s worth a shot,” Marvin said. “I could send you boys to meet him, or we could get someone good.”

“That is some amusing shit you got going there,” Leonard said. “That is funny, how you cut us down, and may really mean it.”

Marvin grinned. “I suggest we talk to Cason Statler. He’s friends with Mrs. Christopher, and he used to work in Houston. Probably has some contacts you could talk to. And, of course, you can talk to the kid’s father. Personally, I don’t think there’s anything to it-no offense, Brett-as it’s been looked into. I’d think the cops would have sensed something being there, even if they are the worst cops since Keystone. But they didn’t note a thing. I think it has to do with Mini. I think she’s the key, and I think it maybe has to do with Ted. The others are connected, of course, but I think the chain starts with her and has to do with something she or Ted knew or something they did. I think Godzilla may just be unlucky, and that Mom was a bad driver and a drunk. But Kincaid, I don’t see it.”

“I like my idea,” Brett said, “because it’s mine.”

“May I have my hat back now?” Leonard said.

Brett gave him the hat.

“Jim Bob is from the Houston area,” I said. “We know him. We’ve worked with him. Maybe he’d do better than Cason.”

“We’d have to pay him out of our money,” Marvin said.

No one said anything for a moment. Then Leonard said, “Yeah, you’re right, let’s get Cason, and we can work on his loyalty to Mrs. Christopher, and just have to buy him lunch or somethin’.”

After Leonard and Marvin left, I set the door back in place, but it was beyond fixing. I didn’t have any boards to nail over it, so I put a chair under the doorknob. A kitten with anger issues could probably have pushed it over, but it was something.

Me and Brett locked ourselves in the upstairs bedroom just in case our two cast-wearing vigilantes escaped the long arm of the law and came after us.

I said, “What you said about the father, Kincaid, that was solid thinking, baby. We’ve been so certain it was someone who just hated these people for their weirdness, or was one of them, that it didn’t occur to us. We should have considered it, but we didn’t, and that’s why Leonard and I do odd jobs and are not professors of physics.”

“That’s the truth,” Brett said.

“I give you a compliment, and you wound me? You are one mean woman.”

“What about Marvin?”

“Well,” I said, “I’m not saying you’re definitively right and he’s wrong, but he thinks of himself as a detective, and on some level, having been a cop, I think he wants to generally believe they know what they’re talking about. And usually, truth is, they do. But sometimes, a person standing back from it all can point out the obvious.”

She snuggled close. “What made me think of the father, Kincaid, really wasn’t obvious thinking.”

“No?”

“No. It was those two jackasses that broke into our house. Here are two guys that had their hand, a knee, and a rib broke. A couple of bully types, the sort they always tell you if you stand up to them they won’t fight back. But they did.”

“Most of those little schoolyard homilies prove to be false. Bullies are not always cowards, but they are always bullies,” I said. “And they had guns. That helps make you braver, just in case you’re lacking in the courage department.”

“They went to the trouble of figuring out who you two were, and coming here. They wanted revenge. I thought Kincaid might feel the same way. And it turns out he has the money to make it happen.”

“It was good thinking,” I said. “I was thinking the law got Godzilla, so what’s for Kincaid to do? It was taken care of. But it wasn’t my son. Had it been, I might not be so easily satisfied.”