CHAPTER TEN

I finished my paperwork on Raynes and went upstairs to have a talk with District Attorney Tom Waller. Tom was in his first term and getting his feet on the ground as chief prosecutor. He’d had three years of prior experience as assistant DA, and before that two years in private practice with a big Houston firm. But like many of us, he’d hearkened when his hometown sang its siren song, and he was settled in, probably for the rest of his life, in the county where he’d been born and bred. From my standpoint he was easy to work with because he remembered me as sheriff from back when he’d been a kid, which gave me a definite advantage.

“So this is it on the Twiller murder?” he asked.

“Not by a long shot.”

“Why not?” he asked in surprise.

“That boy had no reason to kill her, and he didn’t have the balls to do it even if he’d had a reason. There’s more to this mess, and you can bet on that. When is the arraignment? This afternoon?”

He shook his head. “Tomorrow morning. Meg McCorkle was reluctant to set the bonds on anything this heavy. She just passed the buck on upstairs to Judge MacGregor, and he had to be out of town until late this evening.”

“Who’s Raynes’s attorney?”

“The judge appointed Walter Durbin by phone.”

I wasn’t surprised. Durbin was one of the two best trial lawyers in town, a six-foot two-inch cattleman, real estate investor, and attorney with a general practice. He was reasonable, and he would give the boy good representation without holding out false hopes.

“Tom, where this kid is concerned I’m going to need some wiggle room. I’m convinced he didn’t kill that poor woman, but I’m equally convinced that he knows who did. What can we offer him if he talks?”

“You really don’t think he did it?”

“No, I don’t,” I said.

“Why not?”

“My instincts. Remember that I started this job when you were about ten years old.”

“And you’ll never let me forget it, will you?” he said, shaking his head ruefully.

“Nope.”

He played around with his pen for a moment, then said, “I don’t think there’s any doubt that he helped transport the body.”

“Neither do I.”

“If he wasn’t involved in the planning or execution, I could go as low as ten years for accessory after the fact.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

*   *   *

I was on my way across the street to Walter Durbin’s office on the third floor of the old Sequoya National Bank Building when Carla called on my cell phone to tell me that Zorn’s story checked out. I went on upstairs and told Walter’s office manager, Nelda Parsons, that I needed to see him. Nelda was about forty and the same shade of café au lait as Toby, which was natural since she was his older sister by a few years. Their family went all the way back to slavery days in Caddo County, and their father pastored the largest black church in town. She was about five two and petite with short hair and velvet-like skin and liquid brown eyes a man could get lost in. Besides her physical attributes, which were considerable, she was brilliant and said to have a photographic memory. I was convinced that she and Walter had been lovers for several years, but he was divorced and she was a widow, so it was nobody’s business, mine included. “You can go on in,” she said. “I think he’s feeding the snake.”

It was common knowledge around town that Walter kept a six-foot python that belonged to his daughter in a big aquarium in his storage closet. “What’s he feeding it?” I asked.

“Things,” she said, staring me right in the eyes and not smiling. “There’s always something around this office that needs to disappear.”

“If you run short, let me know,” I said. “I’ve got a few ‘things’ I’d like to get rid of, myself.”

When I entered the inner sanctum, he was just closing the door to the storage closet. I didn’t ask him to reopen it. In his early fifties, he was big and broad-shouldered and bald with well-tanned skin and pale blue eyes. A former national guard colonel, he’d been in Desert Storm and won the Combat Infantry Badge and a Bronze Star. He’d also resigned his commission not long after that fracas ended. After we shook hands, I sat down and outlined my problem for him.

“Have you talked to Raynes?” I asked.

“This morning.”

“Walter, let me get right to the point. I don’t think the boy killed Amanda Twiller, but I’m just as sure that he knows who did.”

He leaned back in his big chair and put his booted feet up on his desk and gave me a sad smile. “I believe you’re right on both counts. The kid just doesn’t have it in him.”

“That’s exactly what my gut told me as soon as I got a good look at him yesterday.”

“So where do we go with it?” he asked. “Since we’re obviously talking off the record here.”

“I don’t really want to see him go down for murder one. But it is shaping up as a slam dunk.”

“It looks bad. I’ll admit that.”

“So tell me, is he clamming up because he’s scared or because he’s protecting somebody?”

He held up his hands in supplication. “I can’t get a fix on the kid, Bo. It’s like trying to push toothpaste back into the tube. He won’t look me in the eye, and he gives evasive answers to every question I ask him.”

“Will you let me question him? With you present, of course?”

“I’m willing, but he says he won’t talk to you, so…”

I laid out the deal the DA would go along with. “Put it on the table and see what he says,” I said. “Ten years is a hell of a lot better than life.”

I rose to leave and I was almost to the door when he said, “You know, Bo, if I had to guess, I’d say that poor boy is both scared and protecting somebody. He’s scared of going down for life, and he’s shielding somebody too. Or maybe we’re just imagining things.”

“I don’t think so, Walter. When you add it up, together we’ve got over five decades of experience dealing with these old criminals. That has to be worth something.”

“Maybe so, but it hasn’t made me rich. Has it made you rich, Bo?”

“In friends and experiences, sure. But I’ve always been thankful I haven’t had to depend on my salary to get by. In fact, my deputies need a raise right now.”

“County commissioners,” he said, disdain heavy in his voice. “They want to spend all the money out in their precincts fixing potholes and installing driveway culverts for their constituents.”

“Things are looking up on that front. Charlie Morton has come around to my point of view on just about everything.”

“Ha!” he said. “You must have caught him with some bimbo.”

“Now, you know I can’t talk out of class.”

“Right. The shame of it is that Charlie is the most intelligent and able fellow on the court.”

“That’s why he’ll make the most effective advocate now that he’s born again.”

He laughed. “I bet his conversion experience was something worth seeing.”

“It was spiritually moving, Walter. It truly was.”

*   *   *

I’d been back at the office for about an hour when Linda popped back in. “Did you find anything?” I asked.

“Yep,” she said. “The woman was a neat freak. There were about a hundred empty prescription bottles lined up in rows like little soldiers on the top shelf of her closet.”

“Anything else?”

She nodded and tossed a letter across the desk to me. “I don’t know what it means, but it was hidden way at the back of one of her dresser drawers.”

I opened the letter and quickly read the two pages of neat, almost prim handwriting it contained.

“Who is this Nobel Dennard character?” Linda asked. “Do you know him?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“That letter is a threat, isn’t it?”

“Legally, no. It is skirting a fine line, though. The man is a lawyer and he knows better than to make outright threats.”

I sighed and put the letter back in its envelope and reached for the phone. “Go get the Suburban,” I said. “Wait for me around at the courthouse front entrance.”

“Okay. Where are we going?”

“Over to Center. But first I’m going to call this gentleman and tell him he damn sure better be there when I get there.”