Clifton Adams - Death's Sweet Song

“No, thanks, Joe. Maybe later.”

I went into the kitchen and got a can out of the icebox and opened it. Why had they come here at this time of night? Why in heaven's name had they come? I forced myself to calm down. By sheer will power I stuffed my fear down to the bottom of my guts and held it there. Then I went back to them.

“About those questions. Is it anything special, Sheriff?”

“Can't say yet about that Joe, have you been here all night?”

“No, not all night. I closed the station and went into town to see a movie.”

“By yourself. No one was with you?”

“No, I was by myself.” I tried to grin. “Maybe you've heard; me and Beth Langford kind of called things off.”

He hadn't heard and he wasn't interested.

I said, “What's this all about, anyway? Is it so important that it can't wait till morning?”

“It's important enough,” Otis said. “Joe, how well did you know Bunt Manley?”

Here it comes, I thought. Buy my voice was a thing apart; it answered calmly. “Bunt Manley? Why, I don't know him very well. He put in some federal time for bootlegging a while back, didn't he?”

“When was the last time you saw Manley?”

I started to say I couldn't remember, but I recalled just in time that my dad had seen me with Manley just a couple of hours ago. It would take too short a memory to forget a thing like that.

I said, “Come to think of it, I saw Bunt Manley tonight. Not more than two hours ago.”

“Here at the station?”

“Sure.” I felt a little better. I was convinced that I could make up lies as fast as Otis could ask the questions. “Sure,” I said again. “He drove up to the station just as I was closing up. He wanted some gas.”

“I see. Does Bunt Manley usually trade with you?”

“No, not as a rule. Nearly everybody in town, though, drops in on me at one time or another.”

“What did Manley do after he got his gas?”

“Paid me and drove off, that's all. Say, couldn't you give me an idea what this is about?”

“In a minute. When was the last time you saw Manley before tonight?”

I made a show of thinking. “I can't remember, Sheriff. I might have seen him in town, but not to speak to.”

“I see. Joe, could you give me the time?”

“Sure.” Then I looked at my wrist and my watch wasn't there. “I must have left my watch lying around somewhere,” I said, and started toward the dresser. But Otis stopped me.

He held up a watch and said, “Is this yours, Joe?”

That was when the roof fell in. That watch! I didn't know just what part it was going to play in my future, but I knew it wasn't going to be good. I could see it in the Sheriff's eyes, in the tight lines at the corners of Ray King's mouth. There was absolutely no use denying it was my watch. On the back was the legend “Joseph Hooper, Jr. May 16, 1938,” engraved in the gold. My dad had given me the watch when I was graduated from high school, and if that engraving wasn't enough to settle it, the local jeweler had the records.

It was my watch, all right. But where had it come from? How had the Sheriff got hold of it? I remembered having it on my wrist only a short time before, because I had been counting the seconds while waiting for that train.

Otis Miller said again, “Is this yours, Joe?”

“Yes, it's mine.” That was all I could say.

“Could you guess where we found this watch, Joe?” he asked, his voice silky-smooth, his face bland.

It was like playing barehanded with a swamp moccasin, but I had to play with him until I found out where he was headed. “No, I have no idea where I lost it.”

The Sheriff stood up, a rare smile touching the corners of his thick mouth. “You sonofabitch!” he said softly. “You know, all right.”

Ray King came out of his chair. “Hold it, Otis. Take it easy.”

“Stay out of this, Ray. I swore I'd get the bastard that killed Otto Finney, and by God, I'm going to do it.” He stepped in front of me and shoved the watch in my face. “It's yours, isn't it? You admit it?”

“I told you it was mine.” My heart sank. I could feel the ground falling out from under me.

“AH right, now I'll tell you where we found your watch. Just about an hour ago we picked it up near the railroad tracks where Bunt Manley was murdered. See this leather strap? The stitching is rotten. That's how you lost the watch. You killed Manley, probably while he was here at the station, then you put him in his own car and put the car on the tracks to make it look like an accident. But while you were fooling with that car you caught your watch strap on something and the stitching pulled loose and you lost it. That's the way it happened, isn't it?”

That was exactly the way it happened. But the first shock had worn off and now I was more angry than afraid. I said, “Otis, that's the craziest story I ever heard of. Are you actually accusing me of killing somebody?”

“I'm not accusing you, I'm telling you!”

I turned to the deputy. “Ray, for God's sake, what's got into him? Has he gone out of his mind completely?”

Ray only looked at me. This was Otis Miller's play and he wasn't going to try to take it from him. I wheeled back to the Sheriff.

“Tell me one thing,” I said, “just one thing, before you make any more of these crazy accusations. Why in the world would I want to kill Bunt Manley when I hardly even knew the man?”

“Maybe you didn't want to kill him,” the Sheriff spat. “But maybe you had to kill him. Maybe he came around wanting a bigger share of the money and you decided you had to kill him.”

“What money are you talking about? This gets crazier all the time!”

“You know what money, Hooper. The same money you and Bunt Manley took from old Provo's box factory. If I have to spell it out for you, by God, I'll do it. I've been keeping my eye on Manley ever since he got out of the pen. He's never been any good and I knew sooner or later he'd get himself in bad trouble. So Manley was the one I thought of first when you broke into the factory and killed the old watchman. But Manley couldn't have done the job alone. Somebody had to be in it with him, so when I started looking for a partner I found you.”

The Sheriffs voice was still, soft, and sure.

I was practically yelling. “What the hell do you mean? I thought you were a responsible man, Otis, but here you are building a case on nothing but thin air and making these insane accusations! Well, I've had enough of it! I demand that you offer some proof or shut up and get out of here!”

He grinned. “That suits me fine. We'll start with that bogus bill that you brought around to my office right after the robbery. I knew at the time you were lying through your teeth about just getting it, because that kind of paper hasn't been seen in more than a year. That was a mistake, Hooper, because I started to wonder why you'd go to that much trouble to pump me about the robbery.”

I snorted. “I didn't pump you. I might have mentioned it casually. Hell, the whole town was talking about it. If I mentioned it, do you call that proof that I had a hand in it or killed Manley?”

“And Otto Finney, too,” he said softly. “Don't forget Otto. No, it doesn't prove anything in particular, but it all adds up to a jury.”

We stood there glaring at each other and nobody had to tell me that he had me by the throat and I was fighting for my life. From here on out it would be brass knucks, and I knew it. I tried to get set for it.

“All right,” he said, and his voice was hard now, hitting like a hammer. “Here's something maybe you didn't know. We knew Manley got some ideas during his stay in Leavenworth. We figured he'd try something like this before long. But Manley was smart, we didn't learn a thing from him, so we figured our best bet was to find the man who was in it with him. That turned out to be easier than I had hoped, when we found Otto's body in the lake with that flywheel tied to him. That was your big mistake, Hooper, that flywheel.”