Dead Man Talking

  Chapter 7

  “I — uh — aren’t you supposed to be out there helping your crime team?” I evaded.

  “They know their jobs. They’ll come tell me if they find anything important I should know about. Why were you on your way here?”

  “Oh, crap. It’s a long story. And not exactly all mine to tell. Katy’s involved, and —" The cop I’d nearly run down at the gate came to the kitchen door, and I breathed in relief.

  “Detective,” he said. “The lady — ” he nodded at me “ — can bring her car on up to the house now. They’re done with the driveway.”

  “Couldn’t you have driven it up here, Franklin?” Jack asked.

  “Uh...no...well, maybe. But I didn’t want to take a chance.”

  “Trucker’s in the Jeep,” I explained.

  Jack’s gaze at his officer relaxed. He’d seen pictures of Trucker, and even met the dog and cat once when he stopped by my cabin to get me to sign a book for his boss’s wife. “Well, give the lady a ride down to her car before that dog dies of heatstroke,” he ordered.

  “I left the a.c. on,” I fumed. “I’m aware animals shouldn’t be left in a closed-up car!”

  “Animals?” he asked.

  “I’ve got Miss Molly, too.”

  “Hmmm,” he mused. “You meant to stay a few days. You’d never leave your head cat longer than a day.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Just remember, Jack Roucheau. I’m working on my book, so you can just schedule any statement from me around my work time!”

  I started to huff out of the kitchen, but Katy called, “Alice, you brought Trucker?”

  “Don’t worry, Sugar,” I said, still irritated. “I’ve broken him from marking his territory on the furniture.”

  “God, I hope so,” Katy said. “But there’s a fence around one portion of the back yard — ”

  “Trucker stays with me. If he causes any damage, I’ll take care of it.”

  “Um...have you had Miss Molly declawed yet?”

  “Nope,” I told her, a tad satisfied at the worry on her face. I don’t like it one bit when people won’t accept my animals. But I relented. Katy didn’t need additional stress. “I brought Miss Molly’s scratching post, Sugar. Her litter box, too. Don’t worry. Cats sleep a lot.”

  I hurried out before I got roped into more defenses of my animals. Katy kept animals at Esprit d’Chene, but they were for show. A couple horses — thoroughbreds, of course — roamed her pasture, plus those blasted peacocks strutted freely wherever their hearts desired.

  “The dog’ll be protection, at least,” Jack said behind me.

  I didn’t hear Katy’s answer, because I strode down the hall to where Mr. Quick — Officer Franklin, I guess his real name was — waited. Jack was right. For the most part, Trucker was a mild-mannered Rottweiler, raised with love and discipline. However, the breed has an ingrained protective trait, and woe the person who attacks a member of its circle of love. One night a half-drunk cowboy got lost and found his way to my place just about the time the driveshaft fell out of his rusty old pickup. When I incautiously walked outside to find the source of the noise, he tried to push his way in and use the phone himself, rather than let me call someone for him. Trucker changed the cowboy’s mind real fast when he heard his threatening voice. A hundred and fifty pounds of angry Rottweiler lunged straight through the storm door and launched itself at the drunk with a roar that even gave me the willies.

  Lucky for the cowboy, I caught Trucker in mid-lunge. I still chuckle, though, when I recall the urine stain that spread down the front of those ragged jeans. Maybe from embarrassment, maybe from fear, he politely gave me the phone number of his brother and waited in his pickup until help arrived.

  Officer Franklin drove me down to my Jeep, and I took advantage of the time to see if I could find out if they really thought it might be Bucky in the pool. There was a slew of representatives from various investigative branches of Texas law enforcement here, which meant they had reason to believe this might be a high-profile case. Of course, it was an especially grisly one, but someone — probably Jack — had called in reinforcements. Even his better-staffed Longview police force wouldn’t have done that for a simple murder without just cause.

  “Lots of investigators here,” I mused to Franklin. “You’d think there was a mass murderer loose, not a lone body.”

  He glanced over. “Now, don’t you worry your head none, ma’am." I hate it when somebody not that much younger calls me ma’am. “We’ve got it under control. And we’ll keep an officer ‘round here ‘til we catch the perp.”

  “How will you even begin to investigate until you identify the corpse?” I asked. “And how can you identify him without a head?”

  “Fingerprints, probably,” he said as we neared my car and he eyed Trucker’s nose sticking out the partially-down window.

  “What if his prints aren’t on file?”

  He cast me a frown that I took to mean he wondered why this little woman was so interested in such a grisly matter. “I’m a mystery writer,” I explained. “Remember the book? I know a little about crime investigations.”

  “Oh." He nodded seriously. “Like that Jessica Fletcher woman on TV." I wanted to harrumph and remind him that writers wrote those television stories, but he went on, “You sold any of your books besides that one you gave me?”

  I gritted a tight smile. I never could decide which was worse: people who gush over me in false pretense while they try to finagle the secret of getting their own books published, or people who’ve never heard of my books. “A few,” I said abruptly.

  He pulled up beside my Jeep, a cautious distance away from Trucker’s nose. “I’ll ask Mama what she thinks after she reads hers. She don’t get out much these days, what with her arthritis, so she’ll probably get to it soon.”

  “Don’t you read, Officer Qui — Franklin?”

  “Sure. Got subscriptions to all the huntin’ and fishin’ magazines. Couple car magazines.”

  I got out of the patrol car, trying to think of another way to dig information from him, although Jack would give me what-for if he caught me sticking my nose in. Maybe Jack would forget his promise about no spotlight or good cop/bad cop. But as long as I had this niggling notion about Katy being a suspect, I felt obligated to ferret out all the information I could.

  Both Trucker and Miss Molly waited for a chance to escape as I opened my Jeep door. I shooed them back. If either one of them caught sight of a blasted peacock, it would take forever to catch them.

  “You know." I turned to Officer Franklin with what I hoped was an innocent expression. “I’ve got a similar situation coming up in a future book. An unidentifiable corpse." Well, I might have; it sounds like a great storyline. “What other ways are there to identify someone?”

  A self-important look crossed his face, so I realized I’d hit on the right approach. “Oh, there’s tattoos, birthmarks, stuff like that. Things a family might know about.”

  “I guess you can’t check dental records unless you find the head. What about medical records, blood type, and DNA?”

  “We gotta send DNA to one of the labs in Tyler or Garland. We don’t have equipment like that here.”

  Just then the medical examiner’s hearse came into view, rolling seriously down the driveway from the manor house with its important cargo. And my Jeep was blocking its path.

  “You sound like you know a lot about crime investigation. Maybe I could talk to you, if I run into any problems on my book.”

  “Jack’d be better. I've only been on the force a year. Best move your vehicle, ma’am.”

  I tossed him what I hoped was my publicity smile, so he would get the connection between my professional photo and me dressed in jeans and T-shirt. Then I slid into my Jeep and snapped my fingers to order Trucker into the back seat. I didn’t miss the fact that Officer Quick had forgotten to thank me for the book.

  Trucker slobbered a kiss on my cheek, whined, and wiggled, telling me
he needed a doggie potty break. Miss Molly snubbed me and curled on the front passenger seat to bathe, irritated at being cooped up. I sniffed as I dropped the Jeep in gear, but evidently she’d heeded my reminder about her litter box.

  “You’ll have to wait just another minute,” I told Trucker. He settled down, but panted and stared longingly out the side window at the lovely, fire-hydrant trees. The hearse rolled by, and I noted both the driver’s and passenger’s faces. The passenger was probably the medical examiner. Surprisingly, she was a woman. That was normally a male province in the smaller East Texas towns. This woman looked to be in her mid-forties, a grandmotherly type, and I had trouble picturing her examining a headless corpse, let alone wielding the necessary autopsy tools. But come to think of it, I supposed any autopsy would be performed at a better-equipped facility than the locals had available.

  I’ve never watched an actual autopsy, though. Research from books and interviews works just fine.