Bone Dry

Strangely, Marlin felt a sense of closure. He could report to Garza now, tell him that all avenues had been investigated, and then put all this bullshit behind him.

“Ready when you are,” Colby said, draining the last of his drink.

Both men were in the truck, Marlin about to turn the key, when they heard a familiar sound. It was the clattering of a deer feeder as it slung dried corn for three or four seconds, then went silent.

Marlin looked at Colby, who simply grinned. “You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’?” Marlin asked.

“That a cold beer sounds good?”

Marlin swatted Colby across the arm. “No, you dumb-ass. That nobody checked inside Gammel’s deer feeder.”

“Damn, I bet you’re right.”

Marlin maneuvered his truck through the brush and found the feeder in a small clearing fifty yards from Gammel’s deer blind. The ground beneath it had been worn grassless from the hooves, paws, and claws of all types of wildlife looking for an easy meal.

It was a fairly typical feeder: a battery-operated motor and spinning plate attached to the bottom of a 55- gallon barrel that rested on three metal legs. Eight feet tall, from top to bottom. A drum like that could hold six bags of deer corn weighing a total of three hundred pounds.

Marlin backed his truck up to the barrel, donned a pair of latex gloves, then stood on the rail of his truck bed. Judging by the dust on the feeder lid, Marlin guessed that it hadn’t been disturbed in quite some time. He removed the O-shaped locking ring that clamped the lid to the barrel, then removed the lid itself. He peered down into the feeder.

Deer corn has to be kept dry. If a little moisture builds up inside the feeder, a crusty cake of corn plugs the funnel at the bottom of the barrel. The spinning plate will rotate, but no corn will be thrown. That’s why feeders are designed to be watertight. The corn-and anything else in there-is fairly safe from the weather.

And there was more in this feeder than just corn. Looking down into the barrel, Marlin could see a small bit of clear plastic jutting out of the feed.

“I’ve got something here “

He reached down, grabbed the edge of the plastic, and gently pulled. Up came a large Ziploc bag. Inside the plastic bag was a lumpy manila envelope, a small one, maybe six inches by nine. On it, in ink, were the initials B.G.

Marlin hopped down onto the bed of his truck, went to one knee, and placed the plastic bag on the floor. As Colby watched over his shoulder, Marlin eased the Ziploc open, slid the envelope out, and lifted the unsealed flap. The envelope was filled with cash.

Marlin felt invigorated by his discovery-for about ten seconds. Then he realized it didn’t really change anything. They had an envelope with nearly three thousand dollars in it, but it didn’t tell Marlin where Bert Gammel had gotten the money or why he had been so secretive about it. And it didn’t bring Marlin any closer to proving-or disproving-Jack Corey’s guilt.

Back in the truck now, driving off the ranch, Colby said, “What ya think Garza’s gonna say?”

“I imagine he’ll be glad we found the cash… but we already knew it had to be tucked away somewhere. For all we know, Corey mighta known that Gammel kept his stash somewhere on the deer lease, but he just couldn’t find it after he killed him.”

“It was still pretty smart of you, if you want my opinion. You figured out something that nobody else had. Not Wylie Smith, that’s for sure.”

Marlin gazed out the window at the passing scenery, gently sloping hills thick with cedars, elms, and half a dozen different types of oak trees. “On the other hand,” Marlin added, buoyed by Colby’s remarks, “I can at least send this stuff to the lab in Austin and see if they can tell us anything. You never know-” Marlin stopped speaking in midsentence. Something on his police radio had caught his ear.

He turned up the volume and was startled to hear the voice of Jack Corey. Marlin remembered that Corey had the run of the sheriff’s office now, and was apparently broadcasting from the dispatcher’s radio. Marlin pulled to the side of the road as Corey’s plaintive drawl came over the airways:

“… and I understand why you might think it was me. But you gotta remember that things aren’t always what they look like. Take your boy Wylie here, for instance. I told y’all he held a gun to my head, but did anyone believe me? Hell, no. Well, screw it.…just listen to this goddamn tape before y’all make up your minds.”

Marlin heard Corey fumbling with the microphone, and then the hiss of an audiotape. Corey’s voice came on first:

“At least tell me why you pointed your gun at my head. Don’t you know a man can’t think straight in a position like that?… Well?”

Then Wylie’s answer…

“Okay, I’m sorry about that. I really am. But when I’m investigating a guy for murder, and I feel like I have some solid evidence, I tend to go at him pretty hard. It’s just my style. Let’s say, worst-case scenario, you confess to the murder but you didn’t really do it. We’d know that, because you wouldn’t be able to tell us specifics about the crime scene. And if you did do it-the gun is just my way of speeding things up a little.”

The radio went silent, and all Marlin could think to say was: “Way to go, Corey.”

Phil Colby gave a low whistle. “Now, that’s an interesting development, wouldn’t you say?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

On Friday evening, Sal was sitting in the living room, his bum leg in front of him on an ottoman. Twenty-four hours since that skinny little tree-hugging bastard had broken Sal’s leg, and he was finally figuring out how to manage the pain. This codeine was pretty good stuff-you just had to watch out how much you took, that’s all. Sal had figured that out real fucking quick. It took the edge off the pain, but if you got a little too aggressive with it-say, like popping three pills instead of one-you’d find yourself in la-la land, chasing imaginary wildebeests, wearing a loincloth, all from the comfort of your own bed.

But a pill and a half worked just right, holding the pain at bay without putting Sal into a stupor. Last night had been a wild ride, one weird-ass dream after another. Stranger than any of the trips he experienced as a young punk, when he had occasionally indulged in a few of the drugs that members of his crew were selling. Kind of fun, but you had to keep a handle on that shit. Couldn’t overdo it. Sal sometimes wondered if Vinnie ever took any drugs, but he figured Vinnie was smarter than that.

Speaking of Vinnie, Sal vaguely remembered talking to him earlier in the day, asking him to take care of some things. Sal couldn’t remember exactly what he had asked him to do, but what the hell. Vinnie knew what to do. Didn’t have to spell things out for him anymore. That was the good thing about having a son. You could teach him things, help him learn a few of the basics in life. Like throwing a curveball. Changing the oil in your car. Busting a guy’s kneecaps.

Sal and the family had already eaten dinner, and Angela was doing something in the bedroom now. That’s the way it was: If Sal was in his den, Angela would be in the living room. If Sal came into the living room, Angela would find a reason to go to the bedroom. Sal knew that Angela was pissed off at him about the whole Maria thing (who, by the way, he hadn’t humped in several days, thank you very much), but he was noticing lately that she didn’t even want to be in the same room with him. That’s one angry woman, who can’t stand the sight of her own husband. What the fuck were you gonna do?

Sal was flipping through the channels, not a goddamn thing to watch on TV, when the phone rang.

“Angela, you got dat?” he yelled.

No answer. The phone rang again.

“Angela! Maria!” Where the hell was everybody?

It rang again.