John Katzenbach - Just Cause

'No,' he said again, louder. 'No, ma'am. I'm going to Hook in there, even if you have to kill me. I'm just too damn tired of being lied to. I'm too damn tired of being used. I'm too damn tired of feeling like some goddamn fool all the time. You got it, old woman? I'm too damn tired!'

With each repetition of the phrase, he'd stepped toward her, covering half the distance between them.

'You stay away!' the old woman shouted.

'You gonna kill me?' he shouted back. 'That'll do a helluva lot of good. You just shoot me right in front of these two detectives. Go ahead. Goddammit, come on!'

He began to stride toward her. He saw the shotgun waver in her arms.

I means to!' she screamed.

'Then go ahead!' he screamed back.

His rage was complete. It overcame the delusion he'd clung to of Ferguson's innocence, so that it all poured out of him. 'Go ahead! Go ahead! Just like your grandson killed that little girl in cold blood! Go ahead! You gonna give me the same chance he gave her? You a killer too, old woman? This where he learned how to do it? Did you teach him how to slice up a little defenseless girl?'

'He didn't do nothing!'

'The hell he didn't!'

'Stand back!'

'Or what? You maybe just taught him how to lie? Is that it?'

'Stay away from me!'

'Did you, goddammit? Did you?'

'He didn't do no such thing. Now get back or I'll blow your head off!'

'He did it. You know it, goddammit, he did it, he did it, he did it!'

And the shotgun exploded.

The blast shredded the air above Cowart's head, singeing him and knocking him, stunned, to the ground. There was a rattle of bird shot against the walls of the outhouse behind him; shouts from the two detectives, who simultaneously went for their own weapons, screaming, 'Freeze!' Drop the gun!'

The sky spun above him and his nose filled with the smell of cordite. He could hear a thumping sound deep beyond the ringing from the shotgun's explosion, which confused him, until he realized it was the echo of his own heart in his ears.

Cowart sat up and felt his head, then stared at his hand, which came away damp from sweat, not blood. He stared up at the old woman. The detectives both continued to shout commands, which seemed lost in the heat and sun.

The old woman looked down at him. Her voice was shrill. 'I told you, Mr. Reporter Man, I told you once before, I'd spit in the eye of the devil hisself if'n it'd help my grandson.'

Cowart continued to stare at her.

'You dead?' she asked.

'No,' he replied quietly.

'I couldn't do it,' she said bitterly. 'Like to blow your head clean off. Damn.'

Her skin had turned an ashen gray. She dropped the weapon to her side.

'Only got one shell,' she said.

She looked over toward the two detectives, who were approaching her, weapons drawn, crouched and ready to fire. She fixed her eyes on Brown.

'Should have saved it for you,' she said.

'Drop the weapon.'

'You gonna kill me now, Tanny Brown?'

'Drop the weapon!'

The old woman humphed at him. Slowly, she took the shotgun and carefully set it against the door behind her. Then she stood and faced him, folding her arms.

'You gonna kill me now?' she asked again.

Wilcox bent toward Cowart. 'You okay, Cowart?'

'I'm okay,' the reporter replied.

He helped pull Cowart back to his feet. 'Christ, Cowart, that was something. You really lost it.'

Cowart felt suddenly elated. 'No shit,' he laughed.

Wilcox turned toward Brown. 'You want me to cuff her and read her her rights?'

The detective shook his head, reached over, and grasped the shotgun, cracking it open to check the double chambers. He pulled out the spent shell and flipped it to Cowart. 'Here. A souvenir.'

Then he turned back to Ferguson's grandmother. You got any other weapons lying around?'

She shook her head at him.

'You gonna talk to me now, old woman?'

She shook her head again and spat on the ground, still defiant.

'Okay, then, you can watch. Bruce?'

'Boss?'

'Find a shovel in the storeroom.',

The police lieutenant holstered his revolver and handed the emptied shotgun back to the old woman, who scowled at him. He walked back to the outhouse and gestured to Cowart. 'Here,' he said, handing the reporter the crowbar. 'Seems like you earned first swipe at this thing.'

The old wood protested slowly at the assault first with the crowbar, then with the shovel Wilcox discovered by the side of the shack. But when it finally cracked and gave way, it tore apart rapidly, exposing a fetid hole in the earth. Quicklime had been used for sanitation. White streaks covered the gray-brown mass of waste.

'In there somewhere, Cowart said.

'I hope you got all your shots,' Wilcox muttered. 'Anybody got any open cuts or sores? Better be careful.'

He grabbed the shovel out of Brown's hands.

'It was my search fucked up three years ago. Mine, now,' he whispered grimly. He took off his coat jacket and found a handkerchief in a pocket. This he tied around his face, over his nose and mouth. 'Damn, he said, his words muffled by the makeshift mask. 'You know this ain't a legal search, he said to Brown, who nodded. 'Damn.' Wilcox said again.

Then he stepped down into the ooze and muck.

He groaned once, muttering a series of expletives, then he set to uncovering each layer of refuse, scraping away with the shovel.

'You keep your eyes on the shovel, he said, breathing through his mouth, hard. 'Don't let me miss something.'

Brown and Cowart didn't reply. They just watched Wilcox's progress. He kept at it steadily, carefully, slowly working his way through the pile. He slipped once, catching himself before sliding down into the hole, but coming up with waste streaking his arms and hands. Wilcox simply swore hard and continued working with the shovel.

Five minutes passed, then ten. The detective continued to dig, pausing only to cough away some of the stench.

Another half dozen swipes with the shovel and he muttered. 'Got to be down a couple of years, now. I mean, how much shit can that old lady produce in a year?' He laughed unhappily.

'There!' Cowart said.

'Where?' Wilcox asked.

'Right there, said Tanny Brown, pointing. 'What's that?'

The corner of some solid object had been uncovered by a swipe with the shovel.

Wilcox grimaced and reached down gingerly, seizing the object. It came free with a sucking sound. It was a rectangular piece of thick synthetic material.

Brown crouched down, staring, took the material by the corner and held it up.

'You know what this is, Bruce?'

The detective nodded. 'You bet.'

'What?' Cowart asked.

'One slice of car carpet. You remember, in Ferguson's car, on the passenger side, there was a big piece of carpeting cut out. There it is.'

'You see anything else?' Brown asked.

Wilcox turned back and poked with the shovel in the same location. 'No, he said. 'Wait, unh-hunh, well, what have we here?'

He plucked what appeared to be a solid mass of refuse from the muck, and handed it to Brown. 'There it is.'

The police lieutenant turned toward Cowart. 'See, he said.

Cowart stared hard and finally did see.

The lump was a pair of jeans, a shirt, and sneakers and socks all rolled tightly together, tied with a shoelace. The years of being under the refuse, covered with lime, had worn them away to tatters, but they were still unmistakable.

'I'll bet the farm,' Wilcox said, 'that there's blood residue on those clothes somewhere.'

'Anything else down there?'

The detective struggled for another moment with the shovel. I don't think so.'

'Come on out, then.'

'With pleasure.' He scrambled from the pit.

The three men wordlessly walked back into the yard. They spread the items out carefully in the sun.