“While I was on the reservation I thought of something that might be helpful,” I said, changing the subject.
“Oh?”
I described the foot bone research and explained how the measurements could be used to determine racial background.
“So I may be able to sort out your rainbow coalition.”
“I'll talk with Daniel Wahnetah's kin tomorrow.”
She swirled the ice in her 7UP.
“But I unearthed some interesting facts about George Adair.”
“The missing angler?”
A Crowe nod.
“Adair saw his doctor twelve times during the past year. Seven of those visits were for throat problems. The other five were for pain in his feet.”
“Hot dog.”
“It gets better. Adair's only gone one week, his grieving widow takes a trip to Las Vegas with the next-door neighbor.”
I waited while she drained her 7UP.
“The neighbor is George Adair's best friend.”
“And fishing buddy?”
“You've got it.”
THE NEXT MORNING I SLEPT UNTIL EIGHT, FED BOYD, AND OVERdosed on one of Ruby's mountain breakfasts. My hostess had bonded with the dog, and that day's Scripture lauded the fish of the sea, the fowl of the air, and things that creepeth upon the earth. I wondered if Boyd qualified as a creeper but didn't ask.
Ryan hadn't appeared by the time I left the dining room. Either he was out early, sacking in, or passing up the hotcakes, bacon, and grits. We'd returned from Injun Joe's around eleven the previous night, and he'd proffered his usual invitation. I'd left him on the front porch, swinging without me.
I was climbing to Magnolia when my cell phone rang. It was Primrose, calling from the incident morgue.
“You must have risen with the birds.”
“Have you been outside?” she asked.
“Not yet.”
“It's a great gettin'-up morning out there.”
“Did you get the fax?”
“I surely did. Studied the descriptions and diagrams and took every measurement.”
“You're amazing, Primrose.”
I double-stepped the last few stairs, raced to my room, and opened the file on case number 387. After jotting down the new figures, we compared Primrose's data with that which I'd already collected.
“Each of your measurements is within one millimeter of mine,” I said. “You're good.”
“You got that right.”
Confident that inter-observer error would not be a problem, I thanked her, and asked when I could get the chapter. She suggested I meet her at the parking lot gate in twenty minutes. In her opinion, entry into the morgue was not yet an option for me.
Primrose must have been watching, for as soon as I left the highway she emerged through the morgue's back door and began picking her way across the lot, cane in one hand, plastic grocery bag in the other.
Meanwhile, the guard came forward, read my license plate, and checked a clipboard. Then he shook his head, held one hand in a halt gesture, and signaled me to reverse direction with the other. Primrose approached him and said a few words.
The guard continued to signal and shake his head. Primrose leaned close and spoke again, old black woman to young black man. The guard rolled his eyes, then folded his hands across his chest and watched her continue toward my car, a five-star general in boots, fatigues, and granny bun.
Leaning on her cane, she handed the bag through the driver's-side window. Her face was serious a moment, then a smile lighted her eyes, and she patted me on the shoulder.
“Don't you pay this trouble no mind, Tempe. You haven't done any of those things and they'll see that soon.”
“Thanks, Primrose. You're right, but it's hard.”
“Course it is. But I'm keeping you in my prayers.”
Her voice was as soothing as a Brandenburg Concerto.
“In the meantime, you just take one day at a time. One damn day at a time.”
