 |
Blind Bloodhound Justice First Chapter
(read or print)
 1995
A cold and windy day
January 3, Tuesday, 4:00 p.m.
Hank Cribbs was sprawled on the couch with his shoes off, reading
the Dunston County Daily Times and making an occasional comment. I
was staring out the office window at the bleak view. Dull dormant
grass almost blanketed with reddish-brown pine straw, a goodly
amount of fallen pine cones, and wintering robins in equal
proportions with clumps of gray Spanish moss scattered here and
there by the wind. The sky was the color of slate. A brown and gray
day which had gotten steadily colder since daybreak.
I was debating whether to brave the cold and help feed the animals,
take a nap, or just sit there. I decided to sit. I turned my gaze on
the Honorable Sheriff of Dunston County, Hank Cribbs, whose long
lean frame was prone on my sofa. Being sheriff, he could dress as he
pleased, but he always wore the full dress uniform, warm dark brown
gabardine tailored to perfection. With black hair and dark hawk-like
eyes, he looked good against the contrasting background of the
oatmeal-colored, rough-textured fabric of the couch. I jerked my
eyes up to the area of his head, now hidden by the newspaper.
"Don't you have something to do?"
I sounded grumpy. Eyeing his bod was disconcerting. I wasn't aboutto start that again.
He lowered the paper.
"I don't see you bustling around taking care of business. Am I
keeping you from some important chores?"
"I'm bored," I admitted.
"Bored? You with nothing to do? I'm amazed."
"I have plenty to do, I just don't feel like doing anything. The
weather is depressing. Do you know the radio said the low would be
eighteen degrees in the morning?"
"Which means a lot of frozen well pumps and busted water pipes
tomorrow. Some people prepare for light freezes and think they can
survive the hard freezes by ignoring them."
I didn't bother to agree with such an obvious statement. He watched
me for a few moments, sat up straight, then neatly folding old
closed files, again. Don't you have enough to do with current cases?
Maybe we only need a part-time sheriff if solving crime around here
doesn't fill your days. I'll bring it up at the next county
commissioners' meeting."
"I looked up the old file this morning, but only because I met the
murderer for the first time yesterday afternoon."
He sat there looking smug.
"Aha!" I drawled in my best peach-dripping accent and smiled back at
him, acknowledging that he had hooked me fair and square. I sat up
straighter, turned my chair, and leaned my elbows on the desk. I was
now all ears. "Is the story long and involved? Was it truly a double
murder?" I sighed, and spoke before he had a chance to answer. "Wife
and lover. Same ol' same ol', right?"
"Nope. Both were murdered, but he was only charged with second
degree in the maid's death. They figured he shoved her when she
tried to stop him. Hit her head on the concrete edge of the pool.
Should have been felony manslaughter, but his lawyer didn't fight to
get the charge reduced. It wouldn't have made any difference in his
sentence, and he was probably sickened by the crime like everyone
else. He didn't fight too hard, period. It happened during the
commission of a double kidnapping. That's federal. In my estimation
Samuel Debbs should have got the death penalty. He was lucky to have
received life without parole."
"So why is he walking around breathing free air?"
"Medical parole. When the parole board is sure they're dying, they
kick 'em loose. Heart condition. He looks like death warmed over. I
bet he doesn't last a month."
"When you mentioned a maid, I smelled money. Which old family around
here had all these exciting things happening thirty years ago and
why haven't I ever heard any mention of these crimes?"
"Well, you were two, and I was seven. All the principals moved away
soon after the trial and there wasn't any extended family. With no
one around here to jog the memory, I guess everyone forgot."
"Let me guess. I bet the murderer swears he didn't do it and wants
you to reopen the case and restore his good name before he kicks the
bucket. Am I right?"
"The case needs a lot of time to tell, and you're only half right.
He says he didn't do it, but didn't act concerned about whether I
believed him or not, and he didn't mention that he wanted me to do
anything about it. He was required to state his innocence, since he
hasn't admitted his crime or given a judge his statement of guilt.
It's the reason he had to report to my office within twenty-four
hours of hitting town. His parole was conditional. He could have
received an unconditional if he had given them the facts and owned
up to his evil deeds."
"Are you going to do any work on it?"
"After thirty years?" He laughed. "No way. I just thought you might
like to hear about it."
I held up a hand. I walked over and peered at the coffee left in the
glass container. What was there had the consistency of sludge.
"I'll make a fresh pot."
I headed for the kitchen, and Bobby Lee sat up, stretched, and
padded after me. In March, he'll turn two. He's a
one-hundred-thirty-two-pound AKC-registered bloodhound. Twenty-nine
inches to his shoulder, has a reddish-colored coat with a tiny bit
of tan and white on his chest, and is an extremely handsome dog.
He's also a champion mantrailer, my best canine friend, a permanent
houseguest, and has been totally blind from birth.
Rudy, who was curled in a ball, raised his head to view our
departure but was too lazy to get up and join us. He's a
twenty-two-pound fat tomcat of indeterminate age who decided to move
in a few years ago. His pelt is black as midnight and he has
piercing bright green eyes. He's stubborn, spoiled, and tries to
boss Bobby Lee and me around. When he doesn't get his way, he sulks.
We let him get away with murder just to keep peace in the
family.
In the kitchen I turned on the water and sat the Pyrex container
beneath the stream. I tiptoed to the fridge, eased the door open,
and stealthily slid two Chicken McNuggets from a Ziploc. Bobby Lee
had kept perfect pace with me. I knew better, but it seemed he was
able to sheath his toenails like Rudy. His passage was as soundless
as mine. I had not bred a foolish bloodhound. He knew the treat
would not materialize if Rudy appeared. He inhaled the McNuggets
when I placed them under his nose. We crept back to the sink.
Bloodhounds are born hungry. They seem to crave food more often than
other breeds. Now that Bobby Lee was a mature male, his weight had
stabilized. He got plenty of exercise and wasn't overweight for his
height and bone configuration. Rudy was. He had gained two pounds in
the past year and was obese according to my vet, Harvey Gusman.
Bobby Lee and I entered the office. He went back to his place to the
right of my desk chair to nap, and I made coffee. Hank was waiting
patiently, hands loosely folded in his lap. I placed his coffee
before him, took mine around the desk, and took a cautious sip.
Hank lit up, and I looked away from the enticing pattern of smoke
curling upward toward the ceiling. I could smell the heady aroma
from a distance of ten feet.
"The craving finally eased off some?"
"It's been three months, six days, five and a half hours," I
answered, "but who's counting? And no, the craving hasn't eased off;
I've just had a lot of practice trying to ignore it. No one who
lives here smokes, which helps," I added pointedly.
"You want me to put it out?"
"Nope. Tell me about the murders."
I used up another chunk of my will power. I couldn't avoid smokers.
It would prove that I still had something to fear.
"Do you remember that big hunk of white brick out on Baker's Mill
Road, the one that has the tall white fence around it? It's been
boarded up for years."
"The haunted house?" I blurted. "The one where the baby cries at
night?"
Damn, I could feel the color flooding my face. Hank was emitting
knee-slapping laughter and I felt six years old, about the same age
when I was first told the house was haunted. A playmate had scared
the bejesus out of me.
"Enough already," I said with a sheepish scowl. "You brought back a
childish memory. Proceed."
"It used to be known as the Newton estate," he said, suddenly
sounding somber. "The owner's name was forgotten when the older kids
started rumors about it being haunted. Maybe adults started the tale
to keep their kids from trashing the place, who knows? We've been
called out on several occasions in the past ten years that I've
worked on the force when teenagers on a toot have decided to
investigate. The burglar alarm is wired into the sheriff's
department. We make a lot of noise on the way out there and no one
is around when we arrive. We've really had very little vandalism, so
in theory the ghost stories work."
I felt a cold draft on my back and shivered. "Is that where the
murders took place?"
"Yep. Jo Beth, tell me, do you believe in coincidence? Yesterday
afternoon, I receive a mandatory visit from a convicted murderer who
served thirty years of a life sentence for two murderers that
occurred out there. This morning I received a phone call from a New
York law firm informing me that the owner of the house is moving
back next week. Coincidence? I don't think so. I want you to check
it out for me. I want to know what's going on."
Hank gave me a winsome smile. "Are you willing?"
Excerpted from Blind Bloodhound Justice by Virginia Lanier.
Copyright 1998 HarperCollins Publishers. Excerpted by
permission of HarperCollins Publishers. All rights reserved. No part
of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without
permission in writing from the publisher.
|
|
