Rituals of the Season Read online

  “Maybe he’s out of town and doesn’t yet know,” soothed the preacher who shares head space and believes in the power of positive thinking.

  I left Dwight sleeping and went out to the kitchen to pour myself a glass of wine. Brix Junior’s file boxes were on the counter where Dwight had put them. Why had Tracy asked to see them? And what exactly had been going on in her head these last few days?

  I lifted the lids and looked at the notations on the file tabs. They were in roughly chronological order, so I took the earliest box over to the kitchen table, got out a legal pad and pen for making notes, took a sip of wine, and began reading.

  As is often the case, a lot of the papers were duplicates. Nevertheless, it took me nearly two hours and a second glass of wine to skim through Brix Junior’s preliminary notes, the warrant for Martha Hurst’s arrest, her first appearance and probable cause hearing, and all the witness statements, search warrants, ME’s report, investigating officers’ reports, etc., etc.

  In clear English, it boiled down to a simple set of facts. On a hot Friday in August, sheriff’s deputies had been summoned to the Sandy Grove Mobile Estates, lot #81. It was not their first visit to this particular house trailer. This time, however, it wasn’t to put an end to a loud three-way domestic argument between husband and wife and the husband’s adult son. This visit was triggered by an anonymous call—“Somebody’s got hisself kilt,” said an indeterminate female voice.

  When deputies arrived, the somebody proved to be Roy Hurst, a white male, age twenty-six. From the smells percolating through the trailers when they opened the unlocked door, he had been dead for at least a day and probably longer. Beside the body lay a bloody aluminum softball bat, its handle wiped clean of fingerprints.

  According to the medical examiner’s straightforward report, death came from massive trauma to the victim’s skull with a blunt instrument consistent with the bat. The first blow had probably come from the front while he was either sitting or standing. The others were to the back of his head after he was prone. He had then been turned over and his genitals pounded to a pulp, probably immediately postmortem and probably with the end of the same blunt instrument. Based on the ambient temperature as recorded by the detectives who arrived soon after the first responding officer and on the deterioration of the body, death had occurred three to six days earlier. In other words, sometime between the preceding Saturday and Tuesday.

  The trailer belonged to a Gene and Martha Hurst. Gene Hurst, age forty-nine, was a long-distance van driver for a national moving company. Although family members are the usual suspects, he was meticulously alibied. He had left Raleigh on Friday morning, picked up the rest of his load in Nashville on Saturday morning, and headed west for Tucson and Phoenix.

  I studied photocopies of the time-stamped tickets that plotted Gene Hurst’s drive from one weigh station to another across the width of the country. They showed that he’d pulled out of Nashville around the time his son was last seen on Saturday morning.

  Martha Hurst was a different matter. A thirty-four-year-old hospital aide, she claimed that she had only briefly seen her stepson that morning and never again. Okay, yes, they’d had a violent argument and she’d threatened to break his head, but that was because he’d come over and let himself in while she was taking a shower after he swore he’d given back all the keys from when he used to share the trailer with his dad before they were married.

  “How would you feel if you walked out of the shower buck naked and there was a man standing in your bedroom?” she’d asked Brix Junior.

  When Brix Junior delicately reminded her that she and the younger Hurst had been lovers before she married his father and that he might possibly have seen her buck naked before, Martha Hurst had said yes, and that was all the more reason for him to get the hell out of her house and out of her life.

  As for the rest of Saturday, she had come home from her ball game around six, stood her bats and glove in a rack by the front door, and then taken another shower before going out to celebrate the win. And yes, she might’ve had too much to drink, especially after she discovered that the rings she’d left on her dresser before the game had gone missing; and yes, she might have told her teammates that she wanted to bust his head like a ripe watermelon, but she certainly hadn’t gone home and done it, because he wasn’t there and she couldn’t run him down by telephone. Next morning, she had left for a week at the beach with friends.

  No, she had most certainly not left him to rot on her living room floor. “I’d have my rings on my fingers right now if I’d done that.”

  That was one bit of evidence in her favor, and I added it to the notes on my legal pad because Martha Hurst certainly sounded like a woman who wouldn’t hesitate to go through a man’s pockets looking for her missing rings. The rings weren’t there, but a pawn ticket was.

  The photos of the crime scene were extremely detailed. Every angle of the room had been covered and the body was so well-documented that I could see the maggots on his head and pants and almost read the pawn ticket. There was even a clear print of a bloody dent in the wall, beneath the light switch and thermostat, where the bat had evidently glanced off Hurst’s head on the first swing.

  With such an uncertain time of death—Saturday till Tuesday—it was hard for everyone to prove conclusively where they were, but of the other two strong candidates, one was in jail from Friday night till noon on Monday, when he was conveyed to Buxton for a full mental health evaluation, and the other could prove he was in Charlotte from Saturday morning till Wednesday.

  It was hard to think of killing your stepson and ex-lover and then going blithely off to the beach for a week, but murderers have done weirder things and Martha Hurst did have a history of violence. She had quit high school when she punched out a teacher she said was hassling her; and after completing a GED, she’d lost her first job at a private nursing home because she’d hit her supervisor over the head with a metal bedpan.

  A full metal bedpan.

  From all the reports and witness statements, it would appear that Martha Hurst had been accused because of her angry threats against her stepson, even though she swore she hadn’t seen him again after her admitted run-in with him around midday on that Saturday.

  I was leafing through a final sheaf of Brix Junior’s handwritten notes when Dwight came into the kitchen, rumpled and yawning.

  “Couldn’t resist it, could you, shug?” he said.

  I smiled up at him. “If you really didn’t want me to read these files, you wouldn’t have brought them in the house, would you?”

  He gave me a quizzical glance. “I thought we agreed that we were going to keep our work separate?”

  “We are,” I promised. “You know well and good that nothing about Tracy’s death is ever going to come up in district court.”

  He took a pilsner glass from the cabinet. “So you can meddle in my work, but I can’t meddle in yours?”

  “That’s different,” I said. “Your department generates a lot of my cases.”

  Taking care not to touch where April had so recently painted, Dwight opened the armoire doors to the beer tap Daddy had given him, drew himself a foaming glassful, and held it up to the light in critical appraisal as he always does. Dwight takes the craft of beer-making seriously and keeps a notebook filled with observations about each batch. Some of the recipes he’s developed are as complicated as any chemical formula, with their eighth of an ounce of this and a half-teaspoon of that. The color on this one was a dark golden brown and the head was so thick and creamy that after his first swallow, the rim of the glass was edged in an inch-wide band of foam.

  “Brussels lace?” I asked, having picked up some of the terminology.

  “Pretty, isn’t it?” he said with a touch of pride as he pulled out a chair opposite me. A sweet malty aroma drifted across the table. He took another swallow of the ale and leaned back in his chair so that his muscular, six-three body was almost horizontal and only the back legs touched the f
loor.

  “So tell me about Martha Hurst.”

  “Could I first tell you how much I love you?” I asked softly.

  The chair came down with a bang and he leaned across with his big hands braced on the table to steady himself so our lips could meet. Barley malt, shaving cream, and soap mingled together with something indefinable that could only be the essence of his skin. His kisses are as slow and deliberate as his driving and I never want them to end.

  “Okay,” he said at last, settling back in his chair again. “Tell me about Martha Hurst.”

  When I finished telling Dwight all I’d gleaned from the files about Martha Hurst’s arrest and trial, he said, “Sounds pretty open and shut to me. Any idea why Tracy would want to take another look at it?”

  “Not really,” I admitted. “The only thing I can think of in Martha Hurst’s favor besides the pawn ticket still in his pocket is that I don’t see anything about bloody clothes in the list of items that the deputies removed from the trailer.”

  “Who worked the case?” Dwight asked.

  I looked at the signature on the report. “Silas Lee Jones.”

  Dwight made a face. I’d heard his opinion on Jones before. Not sloppy enough to fire for cause, not one to bust his bustle either.

  “Look at these pictures,” I said. “See all that blood? Whoever did this, you know they had to have blood on their hands, their shoes, their clothes, and yet there’s nothing here about it or those items.”

  “Well, there wouldn’t be if he came in on her again while she was still buck naked from her second shower,” said Dwight. “Did that point come up at the trial?”

  “Who knows? This isn’t a transcript, only Brix Junior’s notes. He did put her on the stand, though.”

  “So?”

  “Against his will. Which means he really did think she was guilty. But she insisted on testifying and he let her. According to his notes—not to mention the verdict—she didn’t make a very good impression on the jury. I gather that Doug Woodall got her to contradict herself about her whereabouts at the time of death, but I’d have to read the transcript to see exactly how she screwed up.”

  “You got time to do that?” he asked.

  I sighed. “Probably not, but I’ll make time if you want me to.”

  “That’s okay. I’ll get one of my detectives to do it if we don’t find out why Tracy was interested in Hurst by the time we finish questioning everyone in Woodall’s office.”

  I was dying to know what they’d found at Tracy’s house, but a pact is a pact and I’d already pushed it with the files.

  CHAPTER 11

  Many men can converse on no other subject than their every day employment. In this case, listen politely, and show your interest. You will probably gain useful information in such conversation.

  Florence Hartley, The Ladies’ Book of Etiquette, 1873

  Dinner at Jerry’s that night was, in many ways, a rerun of the night before except that this time, we were on Dwight’s turf instead of mine. Just as he knows many of the attorneys and judges by sight if not always by name, so too do I know a lot of the deputies and clerks who work out of the Colleton County Sheriff’s Department. Several of them have testified in my court and are familiar faces in the courthouse corridors or around Dwight’s office, but I had met very few of their spouses.

  Bowman Poole, of course, I’ve known for ages because he and Daddy are good friends and he often comes out to the farm to hunt or fish. Of course, he wasn’t elected till after Daddy gave up messing with moonshine, but that probably wouldn’t have mattered. Bo would’ve arrested him, given the chance; and Daddy would’ve still voted for him and contributed to his campaign fund. They appreciate each other. I noticed a long time ago that successful lawmen and successful old reprobates are often just two sides of a single coin. It’s the same with brutal cops and thuggish crooks.

  Fate and circumstances.

  Flip the coin.

  Call it while it’s in the air.

  What makes a Bo Poole good at catching lawbreakers is the same foxy intelligence that makes men like my daddy hard to catch. (For what it’s worth, the only thing Daddy was ever charged with was evasion of income taxes, back when a couple of the little crossroads stores he fronted bought a lot more wholesale sugar than the records showed they’d actually sold. I don’t say that’s good, I just state the facts.)

  Bo’s about my height, late fifties, with thin broomstraw hair, a trim build he carries like a gamecock, and a colorful folksy style that will probably keep getting him elected as long as he wants the job. Of course, colorful and folksy won’t cut it at the ballot box if people don’t feel their sheriff’s competent, and Bo makes sure the department’s clearance rate of violent crimes stays high. He also hound-dogs our county commissioners, always trying for a bigger slice of the budget pie so that he can afford the modern equipment and decent salaries that keep his good officers from being lured off to richer, more urbanized counties.

  The quid pro quo is that he requires his people to keep their skills updated through community college courses and the various seminars the SBI or FBI regularly offer.

  I respect him for his professionalism, but I love him for lazy summer afternoons out on one of the ponds, dabbling my hand in the still water while he and Daddy cast for bass and regale each other with war stories from their checkered pasts.

  Like Daddy, Bo’s a widower, too, so he stood alone at the head of the steps to welcome us where John Claude and Julia had welcomed us the night before.

  “Kezzie Knott’s daughter marrying a sheriff’s chief deputy,” he said, with a kiss for me and a warm handshake for Dwight. “I’d’ve never believed it if it was anybody besides Dwight.”

  “Anybody besides Dwight and I wouldn’t believe it either,” I assured him.

  Deputy Jack Jamison arrived right behind us and introduced me to his wife, Cindy. I knew they’d become parents back in late summer, but for the life of me I couldn’t remember if it was a boy or a girl.

  “How’s that baby?” I asked, hoping they’d give me a hint.

  “Fine,” said Jamison, both of them beaming. His wife was pretty, fair-haired, and, like her husband, a little on the tubby side, but a cuddlesome armful if the way Jamison was looking at her meant anything.

  “This is only the third time we’ve both left him,” she said shyly.

  “We’re honored, then,” I said. “Is he sleeping through yet?” (From listening to some of my friends bitch about it, sleeping through the night seems to be the first big thing in a newborn’s development.)

  “Finally!” said the proud papa, and she added, “In fact, we may have to leave early so I can feed him before he goes down for the night.”

  Which naturally meant that we all immediately cast discreet glances toward her generous bustline. Cindy Jamison seemed like a nice person and I hoped no one else would notice the faint milk stain on the nipple area of her Christmassy gold satin blouse.

  “Well, hey, hey, hey!” called several voices as we passed to the bar area, and glasses were raised to us.

  Tonight, the bar was stocked with beer and wine only, and it was strictly cash. “But,” said the bartender Jerry had provided, “I was told your money’s no good here tonight, Major Bryant.”

  Dwight ordered a glass of Chardonnay for me and, after looking over the selection of beers, settled for a Michelob and added a bill to the tip glass.

  “Hey, girl!” said a familiar voice and there was K.C. Massengill, whom I hadn’t seen since Dwight and I announced our engagement. Her hair was still sun-bleached from the summer—she has a place out on Lake Jordan—but she’s always worn it long and now it was cut in a short, sleek style that flattered her slender neck and sparkly chandelier earrings. More surprising than her haircut was her escort—fellow SBI agent Terry Wilson.

  Once upon a time several years ago, for about twenty minutes between his second and third wives, I actually considered hooking up with Terry. Then I came to my s
enses and faced the fact that I would always come third behind his young son and his job as head of the SBI’s unsolved murders team. Somehow we had the good sense to stay friends—probably because he’s another lawman who likes to fish with Daddy. He and Dwight have gotten tight since Dwight came back to Colleton County, so we run into each other fairly often. He swears that he’s known for at least a year that Dwight and I were on a collision course for marriage.

  “And another one bites the dust,” said K.C., giving me a hug.

  “I like the haircut,” I told her, “but I thought you needed it long so that you could change your looks on stakeouts.”

  She smiled. “No more stakeouts. Got promoted last month and now I sit at a desk most of the time.”

  “Really? Congratulations!”

  Buffing her nails against the tunic of her black velvet pantsuit, she murmured with mock modesty, “Thank you, thank you.”

  “Yeah, we’re gonna get old and fat together,” Terry said, referring to the fact that he himself spends more time behind a desk these days than out in the field.

  Together? It occurred to me that Terry’s son is a sophomore at NC State and no longer a child. And maybe the job’s not quite as all-consuming now that Terry does more supervising than active investigating.

  As for getting old and fat, he might be carrying an extra five or six pounds around his waist, but K.C. was as slim and sexy as ever.

  “So what’s going on here?” I asked her later when we were in the ladies’ room, freshening up our lipstick. “Y’all just ride out from Garner together or are you two seeing each other?”

  “Well, our offices are in the same wing so, yeah, we do see more of each other these days.”

  “C’mon, K.C. This is me. Give.”

  “He makes me laugh,” she said.

  “And?”

  “He’s like that camel that gets his nose under the tent flap, and the next thing you know, the camel’s sleeping in your bed.”