Coming down the muddy road to Sellers’s place, the deputy had to stop the cruiser before a barricade of rubble, chunks of concrete, rotting trees blocking the way. A hand-painted sign: NO TRESPASSING.
Seth, Fielding said. Go in the trunk and get my galoshes for me.
They picked their way around the rubble and started down the road three abreast with their feet sucking in the mud. The grass and weeds grew wild. Not a car’s tire to ford that stretch in quite some time. The half-gone carcass of a deer lay in the ditch with its head raked back, shinbones showing and the ribs like a bent fork. Awful smell. Little white worms where there was still some meat. Trash began to collect in the brush the closer they came. Rusted pieces of dismembered machinery. A black mattress with its guts spilling out. A flaky chassis of a truck on its side with the paint blistered and the windows busted out and vines claiming it as their own. They passed black lumps of human shit with green flies casting about as though the piles were playthings.
The first glimpse of the houseboat came in pieces through the meshwork of elms and underbrush. Then in full view they stood on the bank with expressions like you might expect. All manner of trash covered the ground from water to treeline. Thorny scrub snared the lighter refuse like obscene garlands. Ness covered his nose with his handkerchief. Fielding called Rigby’s name.
Yeh in there Rigby? he said again.
The sun was straight overhead and they waited shadowless under the dappled light for a response.
We’re goin a come aboard Rigby, Fielding called. Clinton unsnapped his holster and was taking out his gun but Fielding held out his hand to stop him.
Maybe he’s out fishin, Fielding said, throwing his chin to where the skiff usually was. Let’s jest see if he’s home first.
Down a footpath worn shiny as leather they scared up a long black snake that lunged like a trick of the eye from beneath a bush and poured like a stream of ink into the water. Clinton kicked a rock after it.
Goddamn them things, he said.
Fielding and Clinton crossed the gangplank first. Ness stood on the bank looking at the houseboat as though it would sink. A bright orange kind of algae Ness had never seen before was thick against the hull and pubic clumps of scum hung from the lines that dipped and rose with the small motions of the boat. An eyeless eelpout twirled between boat and bank with its jaundiced belly facing the sun. Ness heard the muffled rumbling of Fielding’s voice on the other side of the houseboat and stepped cautiously onto the gangplank.
He rounded the corner to find the deputy knocking on the plywood door. Cupped boards of the deck loose over the framing. Ness eyed it all with contempt. On the far shore thin trees grew bent, bowed to the water like penitents at an altar. He paused in front of a window. A wide cobweb strung frame to frame, a furry spider hunkered in the center. Ness tore the web away with a swipe of his hand and was greeted by a cracked wooden face that appeared from the gloom like a ship in fog and gave Ness an abrupt startle. Jesus, he said.
He took his handkerchief and cleaned a circle into the window. Cupped his hands to his face and peered in. In the rheumy light he saw the squalor Sellers lived in. Saw the mannequins in various stages of ruin arranged throughout the room.
This guy work? Ness asked into the window.
Does it look like he works? Fielding said impatiently. He pushed past Clinton and banged the heel of his hand against the door. Come on Rigby, he said. Open the damn door. We ain’t got all day.
Well, said Clinton after awhile. Can always come back.
I ain’t goin to make this trip again, Fielding said. Only way I’m doin it is if he’s comin back in handcuffs. He beat his fist into the door again.
Ness looked intently at the painted face behind the window, the lacy pieces it wore. Another doll was bent at the waist over the table, its panties pulled down to its thighs. He looked back at the one with an auburn wig staring at him from just inside the window and his eyes puzzled over the hole bored into the mouth. Looked as though the red lipstick was fresh. Looked like there were food stains on her chin.
What’s he doing with these mannequins? Ness asked.
Hell if we know, Clinton said. We arrested him awhile back for stealin cosmetics. Maybe that’s what he’s doin with em.
The sheriff turned from the door, his face blooming with frustration. The hell with this, he said. It stinks out here.
The three lawmen made their way from the boat, up the bank and back up the road. From a distance it appeared they might be talking to each other. Deputy Clinton was last in line and when his back vanished from view through the trees and brush and catbrier, Rigby stood from his place in the slough, waist deep in the bursting cattails and reeds with a stringer of bullheads hooked to his pants, recognizing the sheriff and deputy, but muttering something odd about the third, saying, Got a new Johnny a-huntin me. And as warm as the water was, Rigby did not move from that swampy place until they were long gone and he had begun to shiver.
The cruiser swung to the curb in front of the Luther Hotel and Ness reached for the handle. Fielding turned in his seat. Clinton was eyeing him in the rearview mirror.
Say Ed, Fielding said, yeh do me a favor and let me come with yeh if you decide a go down to Sellers’s place again. I don’t want yeh goin down there alone.
Ness nodded and opened the door.
And Ed? Fielding said. Ness paused on the sidewalk, adjusting his hat. Why don’t yeh come out to the house tonight. Wife’s roastin up a chicken. Red taters and pearl onions. Corn on the cob. Ain’t goin a take no for a answer.
That’d be fine, Ness said. Thank you.
It’s the little yella place right behind the courthouse, Fielding said. Come round bout six. I got a bottle I been meanin to try out.
When Ness entered the hotel Fielding faced the windshield. When the car didn’t move the sheriff turned and found Clinton watching him with sad eyes. Fielding grinned good-naturedly.
Hell Seth, he said. You can come too.
Out for an evening stroll on his way to Fielding’s house. The streets of Oscar the color of lavender in the evening light. Ness paused in front of the J. C. Penney window. Eyed the mannequins. Crossed his arms and stood there studying them. Heard the scraping of shoes down the sidewalk, coming closer. Turned to see a small man hunching toward him down the block, walking with some kind of limp. Odd glasses, wearing a ball cap low against his eyes. Came closer.
Hey, Ness said, holding out a hand. Do I know you?
Man looked up, said, Naw. Yeh don’t know me. And went on.