'I didn't hit you that hard,' Crease said.
'Broken capillaries. I get nosebleeds easy.' Edwards was trying to play it cool, roll along with the set-up. It was the smart move to make, and the fact that he made it surprised Crease. 'Give me my beer.'
Crease handed it to him. 'Listen-'
'And the whiskey.'
'Listen-'
'Son, you've just bought yourself a whole world of trouble.'
'I think you should listen-'
'Striking an officer of the law. You can do two years for that.'
Cool but not cool enough. Now he was going to rag talk. You can't spook a guy who's taken your gun away. 'You never were very smart.'
The voice, in the quiet of the house, came on strong and resonant and ancient. Edwards might remember now. The afternoon of the funeral, the days afterward in the jail kicking the crap out of Crease. Edwards' gray matter had gone through a lot, but certain memories would be seared in there good. Crease finished his cigarette. Edwards' expression suddenly smoothed and his eyes flooded with recognition.
Crease thought, Here we go.
'You. You! You're back!'
'I'm back.'
Edwards couldn't control himself. He shot up out of the chair and lunged at Crease, letting out a growl. He hurtled forward, his gut leading the way. He caught Crease around the waist, lifted him off the table, and carried him three steps across the room. The women smiled blankly, watching the scene. Crease spotted one he recognized. It was Reb.
Reb's had enough problems without all you boys chasing her farther off the narrow path.
He let out a sigh just before he was driven into the far wall. A paint-by-numbers of Jesus on a cloud with his arms open swung crazily beside him. A picture of a dog fell to the floor and broke into a hundred pieces. Crease saw it was a jigsaw puzzle that had been glued together and hung up.
Somehow, the very thought of it got the fever going inside him again. Not his past humiliation, his anger, not even his father's death. It had nothing to do with the man's cruelty. For some reason, it was the goddamn dog.
'Okay,' Crease said.
His hands flashed out and plucked the wadded up bits of napkin out of Edwards' nostrils. His fists, almost on their own accord, rapped Edwards twice in the nose until blood burst and arced across the floor. Crease worked slowly, expertly, chopping the sheriff in the throat, driving a knee into his thigh, jabbing, striking him in the solar plexus. It was slow, methodical work, just like Edwards had given him back in the jail cell.
Thinking of the man putting the puzzle together, carefully like a child, working with the glue, and taking the time to hang it on the wall. Probably stepping back to view it with a certain kind of pride, even love. It was taunting as hell, thinking of the guy like that. An affront to his senses.
All of these years adding up to so little, but the dog, man, the dog. That was insulting, that was something he couldn't suffer.
He held his fist high for one more strike, but Edwards was nearly out cold on his feet. It took all of ten seconds. The paint-by-numbers Jesus was still swaying. Crease took the sheriff in his arms and duck-walked him back to his chair. Got him settled, got his feet up again.
He went to the kitchen and found more napkins and a dish towel. He wet them and returned to Edwards, who was moaning the way Crease's father used to moan in the gutter after the whores had thrown him out on the street.
This damn town, he couldn't do anything without thinking of the old man.
Crease started to wash the blood from the sheriffs face. He checked the nose. It wasn't broken this time, but kept on bleeding. He got more napkin up in there. Pressed the cold towel to the Edwards' forehead, wet down his neck. The sheriff quit moaning and started to snore. Crease sat back on the coffee table and lit another cigarette.
A part of him very much wanted to clean up the jigsaw pieces. He thought maybe he was losing some of his edge in Hangtree.
Edwards was enjoying his nap. He cooed like a baby. It took a while for him to wake up.
Crease said, 'I'm on the job. You're not about to bully me. You want to file charges, you do it. You want to come at me some other way, that's fine too. But that's for later. Right now I want to know about Mary Burke. You were there the day of the switch.'
For a second it looked like Edwards might try to muscle his way through, like he was going to dive across the room again. But then he shifted, grunted in pain, visibly deflated and sank back in the chair.
He said, 'I was there. The switch never happened.'
'You were going to pull a job and grab the cash. You were staked out in the woods, keeping an eye on my old man. You were both dirty and had the same idea to bounce the fifteen grand.'
Edwards said nothing.
'My father hid the cash in the mill. Somebody cut the girl loose and plucked the money, probably while he was dozing or too drunk to notice. You got impatient after all those hours and showed at the door. You both tried to ice each other and the girl got it instead.'
'I didn't want to kill him. I-'
The way he said it got Crease curious. 'What?'
Edwards had some trouble getting it out. He tried to sit up in the chair but he hurt too much. He let out another groan through his clenched teeth. Whatever he was about to say was coming up from down deep.
'What?' Crease repeated.
'He taught me everything! He was my friend! Don't you know that? Don't you see that, you shit? My mentor.' Edwards' feet bounced against the foot rest like an angry child's. 'I wasn't there to steal the money, I was looking out for him! I knew what he was planning. I could see it in his eyes, the way he was walking around the office. I didn't want him to make the worst mistake of his life. Fifteen g's, it was nothing. All he had to do was lay off the sauce and get himself organized. But he was too drunk most of the time. He wouldn't listen to me, couldn't see the only way to get out was to step up and clean up. It was easier for him to hatch a stupid plan on the spur of the moment. He snatched the money and was too wasted to even cover his zone. I walked in to check on him and he got off one shot and killed Mary Burke. I thought he was ready to shoot me too, to cover it up, and I fired a warning shot over his head just to settle him down, get that fucking notion right out of his head.'
Crease looked away. He spied the dog in pieces again. All those years of torment because Edwards felt angry and ashamed at being let down by the old man. In a way they were brothers. Jesus.
'I don't know what happened to that money,' the sheriff said. 'Nobody does.'
'Somebody does,' Crease said.
'So that's what you want?' Edwards let his smile out, showing off all those teeth again. It was still the movie star's leer, he hadn't lost that. His voice was starting to go out, weak from Crease having jabbed him in the throat. He swallowed more beer. 'That fifteen grand? Just like your father.'
You think of a little six-year-old girl and you can't imagine that a bullet could get inside that tiny body and actually fragment into even smaller pieces. Fact is, a little kid, with soft bones, the bullet races around ricocheting for a while until the kid's cut apart and there's hardly anything left of the slug.
We're not going home, Teddy. We're never going home again.
Crease felt his blood rushing even as his face broke out in sweat. In seconds his hair was dripping and he had to mop his brow and upper lip. He started to pant and the moisture ran down his neck.
Edwards said, 'What the hell is wrong with you? You sick? Have a bite of whiskey.'
'Shh. Let's not get distracted. Who were your suspects?'
'We only had one. Your father.'
Crease sat back and lit another cigarette. 'He didn't do it.'
'I'm still not so sure about that.'
'I am. He wanted the cash but he didn't score the girl. It just fell into his lap.' Crease let out a trail of smoke, looking up at Reb in the photo, smiling and looking happy, holding Edwards' hand. They made a good couple.
