Джон Коннолли - The Dirty South

Knight set the papers aside and walked down to the cells. Parker was lying on his bunk, one arm over his eyes, the remains of his breakfast on a tray beside him; Knight had instructed Billie to pick up food from the Dunk-N-Go before heading out to deliver the rolls of film to her son.

‘You still doing okay?’ he asked Parker.

‘I finished the book.’ Knight had dug up a battered copy of Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle for Parker to read. ‘So unless you can promise me a library card, I’m about ready to leave now.’

‘I have to wait for the chief to get back. I can’t let you go before then. But we know who you are, and I’m sorry you’ve ended up in that cell. You could have helped yourself more, but I’m not going to question your reasons for remaining silent. We’ll get it all straightened out when Evan returns.’

Parker still hadn’t changed position, or even glanced in Knight’s direction.

‘I hear you have another body.’

‘That’s right.’

‘You might not, if someone had glanced more closely at the others.’

‘I agree with you.’

‘I’m sure,’ said Parker, ‘that your agreement will be a source of great easement to the dead girl’s family.’

Knight took out his pipe and tobacco and began filling the bowl. He’d long ago acknowledged that it had become a tic for him when under stress. Sometimes he’d just work at filling and tamping, and not even bother lighting the tobacco.

‘I got to reiterate that you’re hard to warm to,’ said Knight.

‘Me and this town both.’

‘Well, it’ll be behind you soon enough.’

‘Thanks for breakfast,’ said Parker, and turned again to face the wall.

18

Tucker McKenzie had met a lot of lawmen like Jurel Cade in his time, but never one quite as fully developed in his failings as much as his strengths. Cade’s particular essence was not entirely venal, yet he was rotten at the extremities, and like all such corruption, his was progressive and incurable. It was hard to rise to a position of authority in a county like Burdon without being compromised to some degree, but impossible to continue in that office without becoming fatally perverted. At the same time, Cade was committed body and soul to Burdon, and his level of tolerance for domestic violence, sexual abuse, theft, assault, and murder was generally low. In that sense, his behavior in the case of Patricia Hartley might have been considered out of character, were it not for the larger context. Where Jurel Cade was concerned, in any conflict between the county and the individual, the individual must lose – unless the individual in question was wealthy and powerful, in which case what was best for them would probably also be best for Burdon. This worldview, though, might have been ordered and colored by the fact that Cade’s own family was the wealthiest and most powerful in the region.

Now McKenzie watched while Cade and Griffin prepared to go at it before an audience that also consisted of one of Cade’s deputies, two members of the Cargill PD, Reverend Nathan Pettle, and Russell Sadler, the local mortician contracted to deliver human remains to the state medical examiner in Little Rock, despite Loyd Holt’s best efforts to wrench the contract from him. Beside Sadler stood his daughter Mary Ann, who was being groomed to take over the business once her father was himself planted in the ground. Already there were mutterings of discontent in the county about this proposed succession, a significant section of the population being of the opinion that God had not intended women to be undertakers, members of the female sex being perceived as lacking the requisite dignity and solemnity. Since Mary Ann Sadler had never yet been known to smile, and was reckoned to have emerged from the womb already dressed in black, solemnity didn’t appear likely to be a problem, and it all came down to a general resistance to change. Russell Sadler was of the opinion that people would come around in time, and probably sooner rather than later, given the necessity of seeing to their dead, and the absence of any multitude of choices. It was either the Sadlers, the Ryans up in Toving – who were Catholic, and therefore suspect as far as the roadside churches were concerned – or Loyd Holt, who overcharged and underperformed, and had once dispatched the wrong corpse to a church, the error being discovered only at the end of the service.

Sadler had already taken a look at the remains, and he and McKenzie had agreed that it might be best if the branches lodged in the body were cut before she was placed in the hearse. Sadler had a small electric saw that would do the trick without causing excessive movement or vibration, thereby avoiding further internal damage. He was about to start work when Cade arrived, and all labor ceased. Now it was a question of seeing which side would prevail in the dispute over jurisdiction.

‘The fuck is going on here, Evan?’ Cade asked.

‘You might want to modify your language,’ Griffin replied, ‘or else we’re going to start this conversation with a falling out.’

Cade took a deep breath.

‘Take it as done,’ he said, ‘but the question stands.’

‘We have another body, mutilated in a manner not unlike the Hartley girl.’

‘I can see a body, but I don’t know about the rest. Why wasn’t I informed? Why’d I have to wait to hear about it from Loyd Holt?’

‘We’d have informed you in due course, as a professional courtesy. For now, we’re still busy documenting the scene.’

‘The hell with professional courtesy: I should have been told the moment you found that girl.’

‘Jurel, this land falls under the jurisdiction of the Cargill PD, not the sheriff’s office. If we require assistance, we’ll ask, but any investigation will be conducted by my department.’

‘We’re beyond the town line here,’ said Cade. ‘This is part of Botile Township.’

‘Which has contracted Cargill to provide police services.’

‘I would dispute that interpretation, Evan, and also advise you to be less confrontational in your manner.’

‘I’m not being confrontational.’ Griffin kept his tone even. ‘I’m simply stating the facts. This is our case.’

Cade turned from him to address McKenzie.

‘How far have you got, Tucker?’

‘We’re done, Jurel, or good as.’

‘You address your questions to me, Jurel,’ said Griffin quietly.

Cade ignored him. ‘And the evidence you’ve processed?’

‘I said,’ repeated Griffin, louder now, ‘you address your goddamned questions to me!’

Cade redirected his attention to Griffin, but with all the obvious reluctance he could muster, and with his anger barely contained.

‘I think we ought to conduct this discussion somewhere more private,’ he said.

‘Happy to do it, once I’ve finished here. That girl’s body is going to Little Rock to be autopsied at the state crime laboratory. When she’s gone, you and I can sit down over coffee, and see if we can’t arrive at some agreement on how best to proceed.’

Cade was coming to the conclusion that this particular phase of the battle was lost. He returned to the remains and lifted the plastic sheet that was covering them. What might have been sorrow clouded his face, although the precise source of it, in Griffin’s view, could have been the potential ramifications of the murder as much as, if not more than, the fact of it.

‘You identify her yet?’

Griffin had already warned Pettle to stay silent, and so had no fear of being contradicted when he answered that they were not yet certain of the victim’s identity. He saw Pettle look to the ground, and decided that the reverend would have made a shitty poker player, so it was just as well that his church frowned on gambling.