Unspeakable Read online

  He went about the clean-out methodically and efficiently, but he was inexorably working his way toward 1976. By the time he got to that year’s files, the coffee had gone sour in his stomach and he was belching it.

  One file was different from the rest chiefly because it was larger and had seen the most use. It was comprised of several manila folders held together by a wide rubber band. The edges of each folder were soiled, frayed, and curled, testifying to the many times they’d been reopened, fingered as Ezzy reviewed the contents, spilled on, wedged into the cabinet between less significant folders, only to be removed again and put through the same cycle.

  He rolled the rubber band off the folders and onto his thick wrist. He wore a copper bracelet because Cora said copper was good for arthritis, but you couldn’t tell it by him.

  Stacking the folders on his desk, he sipped the fresh coffee that the deputy had refilled without any acknowledgement from Ezzy, then opened the top one. First item in it was a page from the Blewer Bucks yearbook. Ezzy remembered the day he’d torn out this page of the high school annual to use for reference. Senior section, third row down, second picture from the left. Patricia Joyce McCorkle.

  She was looking directly into the camera’s lens, wearing an expression that said she knew a secret the photographer would love to know. Activities listed at the end of the row beneath her name were Chorus, Spanish Club, and Future Homemakers. Her advice to lowerclassmen: “Party, party, party, and party hearty.”

  Cap-and-gown photos were rarely flattering, but Patsy’s was downright unattractive, mainly because she wasn’t pretty to begin with. Her eyes were small, her nose wide and flat, her lips thin, and she had hardly any chin at all.

  Her lack of beauty hadn’t kept Patsy from being popular, however. It hadn’t taken long for Ezzy to learn that Patsy McCorkle had had more dates than just about any other senior girl that year, including the homecoming princess and the class beauty.

  Because, as one of her classmates—who now owned and operated the Texaco station on Crockett Street—had told him, stammering with embarrassment, “Patsy put out for everybody, Sheriff Hardge. Know what I mean?”

  Ezzy knew. Even when he was in high school there had been girls who put out for everybody, and every boy knew who they were.

  Nevertheless, Patsy’s soiled reputation hadn’t made it any easier for him to go to her home that hot August morning and deliver the news that no parent ever wants to hear.

  McCorkle managed the public-service office downtown. Ezzy knew him to speak to, but they weren’t close acquaintances. McCorkle intercepted him even before he reached the front porch. He pushed open the screened door and the first words out of his mouth were, “What’s she done, Sheriff?”

  Ezzy had asked if he could come in. As they made their way through the tidy, livable rooms of the house to the kitchen, where McCorkle already had coffee percolating, he told the sheriff that lately his girl had been wild as a March hare.

  “We can’t do anything with her. She’s half-wrecked her car by driving it too fast and reckless. She stays out till all hours every night, drinking till she gets drunk, then puking it up every morning. She’s smoking cigarettes and I’m afraid to know what else. She breaks all our rules and makes no secret of it. She won’t ever tell me or her mother who she’s with when she’s out, but I hear she’s been messing around with those Herbold brothers. When I confronted her about running with delinquents like that, she told me to mind my own goddamn business. Her words. She said she could date anybody she damn well pleased, and that included married men if she took a mind to. The way she’s behaving, Sheriff Hardge, it wouldn’t surprise me if she has.”

  He handed the sheriff a cup of fresh coffee. “It was only a matter of time before she broke the law, I guess. Since she didn’t come home last night, I’ve been more or less expecting you. What’s she done?” he repeated.

  “Is Mrs. McCorkle here?”

  “Upstairs. Still asleep.”

  Ezzy nodded, looked down at the toes of his black uniform boots, up at the white ruffled curtain in the kitchen window, over at the red cat stretching itself against the leg of the table, onto which he set his coffee. “Your girl was found dead this morning, Mr. McCorkle.”

  He hated this part of his job. Thank God this particular duty didn’t come around too often or he might have opted for some other line of work. It was damned hard to meet a person eye-to-eye when you had just informed him that a family member wasn’t coming home. But it was doubly hard when moments before he’d been talking trash about the deceased.

  All the muscles in the man’s face seemed to drop as though they’d been snipped off at the bone. After that day, McCorkle had never looked the same. Townsfolk commented on the change. Ezzy could pinpoint the instant that transformation in his face had taken place.

  “Car wreck?” he wheezed.

  Ezzy wished that were the case. He shook his head sadly. “No, sir. She, uh, she was found just after dawn, out in the woods, down by the river.”

  “Sheriff Hardge?”

  He turned, and there in the kitchen doorway stood Mrs. McCorkle wearing a summer-weight housecoat spattered with daisies. Her hair was in curlers and her eyes were puffy from just waking up.

  “Sheriff Hardge? Pardon me, Ezzy?”

  Ezzy looked toward the office door and blinked the deputy into focus. He’d forgotten where he was. His recollection had carried him back twenty-two years. He was in the McCorkles’ kitchen, hearing not Frank, but Mrs. McCorkle speaking his name with a question mark—and a suggestion of dread—behind it. Ezzy rubbed his gritty eyes. “Uh, yeah, Frank. What is it?”

  “Hate to interrupt, but Cora’s on the phone, wanting to know if you’re here.” He winked. “Are you?”

  “Yeah. Thanks, Frank.”

  The moment he said hello, Cora lit into him. “I don’t appreciate you sneaking out while I’m asleep and not telling me where you’re going.”

  “I left you a note.”

  “You said you were going to work. And since you officially retired last night, I couldn’t guess where you are presently employed.”

  He smiled, thinking about how she looked right now. He could see her, all sixty-one inches of her drawn up ramrod straight, hands on hips, eyes flashing. It was a cliché, but it fit: Cora was prettier when she was angry. “I was thinking ’bout taking you out to breakfast at the IHOP, but since you’re in such a pissy mood, I might ask me some other girl.”

  “As if any other girl would put up with you.” After a huffy pause, she added, “I’ll be ready in ten minutes. Don’t keep me waiting.”

  He tidied up before leaving the office and gathered what he’d salvaged into some boxes the county had thoughtfully provided. Frank helped him carry the boxes to his car. After they were loaded into the trunk, they shook hands. “See you ’round, Ezzy.”

  “Take care, Frank.”

  Only after the dispatcher had returned inside did Ezzy lay the McCorkle file on top of the others. He wouldn’t unload the trunk while Cora was around. If she saw that file, she would know that was what had got him up in the middle of the night and had kept him occupied these last few hours. Then she really would be pissed.

  Chapter Three

  Carl whispered to Myron, “It’s tomorrow now, remember?”

  “Sure, Carl. I remember.”

  “So don’t do anything that might keep you from getting into that road-crew van.”

  “I won’t, Carl.”

  Dumber than dirt, Carl was thinking as he gazed into the cerebral desert behind Myron’s clear eyes.

  Although it wasn’t quite fair to question Myron’s behavior when he himself had come close to screwing up their plan. All he’d done was try to protect himself from a sound beating. But if he had it to do over again, he wouldn’t fight back.

  After that nigger attacked him, he’d gone plumb berserk with rage. It had taken four men to get him into the infirmary and strapped onto the bed. Even then he’d managed to bite
a chunk of flesh from the forearm of a male nurse. They couldn’t give him a sedative because they hadn’t yet examined his head to determine the extent of his injury.

  Uncaring about the blasted headache, he had ranted and raved the rest of that day and the livelong night. He had screamed like a banshee, railing against God, and the devil and the niggers, who might have cost him his one chance for escape.

  In hindsight he realized he should have lain there in the dirt and let that weight lifter keep on kicking him till the bulls got there and pulled him off. How much damage could have been done in a matter of a few more seconds?

  He’d been diagnosed with a mild concussion. He had vomited a few times. His vision was slightly blurry, but it had completely cleared by late the following day. He’d had a headache that no amount of medication had alleviated; it had finally just worn off. His kidney was bruised and sore, but the doc said no permanent damage had been done.

  He’d suffered a few days of discomfort, but he had been grateful for the injuries. They demonstrated to the warden that he was the injured party and that he had only been trying to protect himself when he kicked the other prisoner in his privates.

  Carl had derived tremendous satisfaction from leaving the infirmary intact, able to walk out under his own power, while the nigger’s balls were still swollen. Their grotesque size was a source of amusement for everyone in the infirmary. He had a tube stuck in his dick, peeing for him, which also generated all sorts of ridicule. He cried like a baby every time he moved.

  So in the long run, it had worked out all right. The doc had declared him fit to go back to work on the grounds maintenance crew, making him eligible to pull road-crew duty as well. Squeaking by once, he was taking no more chances on getting disqualified for that special detail.

  Since leaving the infirmary, he had kept his distance from the rest of the prison population, except for Myron. He hadn’t engaged anyone in conversation. He hadn’t looked askance at anybody, especially the blacks. He hated like hell to leave without killing one of them in retaliation for all the grief they’d given him over the years, but in the grand scheme of things, it just wasn’t worth it. He might have a few fleeting moments of enjoyment from seeing their blood run, but then his ass would be hash. He would never see the light of day again. And he had a real hankering to see just how bright the sunshine was in Mexico and to taste all the exotic pleasures that country had to afford.

  But he had to get out of here first.

  Today his and Myron’s names had appeared on the list. Tomorrow was the day. He had waited for it. Planned it. A few hours from now he would be a free man. If everything went his way. There was a lot that could go wrong. That’s why his stomach was so nervous he could barely choke down the beanie-wienies and sauerkraut on the dinner tray.

  But he ate the food anyway to keep from drawing the screws’ attention and arousing their suspicion. “Myron, tonight before you go to sleep, you might try going over the plan in your mind.”

  A spoonful of sauerkraut disappeared into Myron’s mouth. “What plan, Carl?”

  “Jesus,” Carl muttered. This was hopeless. How many times had they been over it? If the idiot fucked this up for him, he would kill him with his bare hands. Taking a deep sigh of resignation, he said, “Never mind, Myron. You just stick to me like a fly to shit tomorrow, okay?”

  “Okay, Carl.”

  “When I tell you to do something, I want you to do it, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “No arguments, no discussion, just do it, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Go stick your dick in a meat grinder, Myron, okay? Okay, Carl.

  On the verge of screaming with frustration, Carl reminded himself that this was the kind of blind obedience he wanted and needed. He was the top gun, the leader, the head honcho. He was the dashing, good-looking, shrewd ladies’ man, strategist stud. In an operation like this, there couldn’t be more than one boss. It needed mules, too.

  So actually it was better that Myron was dumb and obedient to a fault. Because when Carl told him to do something—like, say, slit the bastard guard’s throat—that’s what Myron would do.

  Without shame or remorse, Myron had told Carl stories about his childhood. Young Myron Hutts had been one twisted fuck. He’d been a one-man extermination brigade in his town, ridding the community and outlying areas of pets and small animals before the authorities finally caught him and sent him away for psychiatric analysis. Members of his family had petitioned the state authorities until they finally released him from the head hospital. They lived—not for long, however—to regret it.

  Myron had spoken matter-of-factly about their slaughter. “Grandma’s head went plop, and her wig come right off. It fell into the gravy bowl.”

  Myron was particularly fond of telling that part because on occasion Grandma had used Myron’s head as a wig form while she was putting curlers in it. The rest of the family always laughed hysterically upon seeing their tall, gawky Myron in Grandma’s gray wig all wound up in pink sponge curlers.

  His head had also been used as a punching bag when his old man got drunk and disorderly. One particularly bad drinking binge had resulted in Myron’s retardation. His daddy had repeatedly slammed the head of his two-year-old son into the room radiator. It had been summer and the radiator was cold, but it had done its damage just the same.

  From that day on, Myron was an easy target for verbal and physical potshots. He was made fun of at school, routinely abused by the bullies. But it was his family—Dad, Mom, sister, and Granny—who tortured and humiliated the boy for their amusement.

  They didn’t laugh the evening Myron came to the supper table with a hatchet and a shotgun.

  He’d made one hell of a mess of his family. A killing like that, it was a wonder he hadn’t been deemed criminally insane and confined to a psychiatric hospital for analysis and healing. Most likely a fire-breathing prosecutor had argued that Myron was bright enough to go to the big house, and that if he were confined to a hospital rather than sentenced to a maximum-security prison, the state would be running the risk of some bleeding-heart shrink eventually declaring him “cured” and unleashing him on an unsuspecting public. And, in fact, he showed no compunction against killing. Bugs, animals, people—you name it. Carl had watched Myron torture small creatures for hours before killing them.

  Oh, yes, Carl needed a Myron. A case could be made that he was taking advantage of Myron just as ruthlessly as had the bullies in his grade school. But, as with all twinges of conscience, Carl ignored this one.

  Feeling a sudden rush of affection for the man who obviously idolized him, Carl leaned across the table and smiled at his confederate. “Have I told you the two things I’m gonna do when I get outta here, Myron?”

  “Find some sweet Mexican pussy.”

  Carl laughed. “You remember that one, don’t you, Myron?”

  “Yeah, I remember that one.” Myron smiled through a mouthful of beanie-wienies.

  “That and what else?” Carl asked. “What else am I gonna do?”

  Myron pushed the food down his throat with a hard, noisy swallow. “Kill the motherfuckers who got you put in prison.”

  Chapter Four

  Jack Sawyer stepped down from the cab of his pickup. “Need some help there?”

  His footsteps crunched across the loose gravel of the driveway, sending up small clouds of dust that resettled on his scuffed snakeskin boots, boots handcrafted by a Mexican saddle maker more than a decade ago. The old guy had been fond of taking frequent tequila shots, so Jack’s left boot was a fraction of an inch longer than the right. He’d never asked the cobbler to correct it. Instead, his foot had adjusted to the slight imperfection.

  The boy to whom he had addressed the question seemed particularly interested in his boots as he watched Jack’s approach with unconcealed curiosity, his tongue tucked securely in his cheek. Jack had no experience with children, but he estimated the boy to be about five years old. He nudged his mother�
��s thigh to get her attention, but she brushed his hand aside while her head and shoulders remained beneath the hood of the car, where she was examining an engine that was obviously giving her trouble.

  The boy started toward him. They met about halfway between Jack’s pickup and the stalled car. The kid tilted his head back to look up at Jack and squinted against the bright noon sun. Jack said, “Hi.”

  “Did you know I have a book about dinosaurs?”

  “No kidding?”

  “A video, too.”

  “Hmm.”

  “Velociraptors are my favorite.”

  “You don’t say? Mine, too,” Jack told him.

  “Really?”

  “Yep.”

  “Cool. What about pterodactyls?”

  “Pretty scary, those pterodactyls.”

  The boy gave him an approving grin, which revealed a space recently vacated by a front tooth. The new one had pushed through his gums to form a jagged little mountain range in the gap.

  He was a cute kid, dressed in shorts and sneakers and a T-shirt bearing the likeness of a TV cartoon character whom Jack recognized but couldn’t name. The boy had rosy cheeks and a healthy sprinkling of freckles. A few strands of dark hair were sweat-stuck to his forehead.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Jack. What’s yours?”

  “David.”

  “Pleased to meet you, David.” He hitched his chin toward the car. “What seems to be the problem?”

  The boy shrugged, pulling both shoulders up beneath his ears and extending his arms at his sides, palms up. “I dunno. My mom and me were going into town, but when we got in the car it went like this.” He made a choking sound and gyrated like somebody with a terrible palsy. “Then it stopped and my mom can’t start it again.”

  Jack nodded and started moving toward the car and the woman, who wasn’t nearly as friendly as her son. Either that or she didn’t welcome the interference of a stranger. Or she was scared of him and thought that maybe if she just ignored him he would go away. “Uh, ma’am? Can I be of help?”