Dead Ringer Page 11

  Close enough now to pick up chatter, we stopped. I realized that these folks were talking, but not to one another. Rather they were muttering to themselves. A man near to our position shouted expletives as he rooted through his belongings. A heavyset woman at the curb chanted to the moon.

  The hot breeze sent rotting garbage and fecal smells swirling around us. My hand came up to cover my nose. I’d have to watch that. Control my natural impulses.

  The sun dropped and it got dark fast. I jumped when a woman shrieked, her cries coming from deep within the shadowed recesses of the viaduct. My body tensed involuntarily. “It sounds like somebody’s hurting her,” I said. I was ready to rush to help, but Morales gripped my arm.

  “Get used to it.”

  There we were, a trio of clean—albeit sweaty—professionals, staring at those who society had dismissed as unworthy. The hazy moon high above made me realize how small we all were, and I felt suddenly unworthy myself. How often had I passed these people on State Street or Michigan Avenue, too caught up in my own life to think about theirs. Too smug in my assumptions that they were begging for change, only to spend it on booze, or worse.

  Morales must have seen indication of my self-flagellation reflected in my expression because he said, “Remember Vicki who you met tonight. We’ve tried hard to help her, but the addiction is too powerful. You can’t help everyone. The best we can do is hope that God will intervene at some point.”

  “An odd sentiment from someone who’s dedicated himself to do just that.”

  “Each passing year causes me to become more jaded. I pray for patience, for wisdom. But I am one man, and I realize my limitations.” He sighed. “I have, as you pointed out, dedicated my life to helping the forsaken. This is my life. This is not yours. I applaud your intention—your desire to illuminate the homeless’ troubles. I have, unfortunately, seen this scenario before. Your efforts will be—in the long run—superficial. Nothing but a Band-Aid solution for the homeless even while they provide a feature story for you.”

  That stung. I looked to Nicky, but he seemed to be preoccupied with watching the scavenging crowd. I had a sudden memory of him staring at an ant farm in our basement. His face held that same dispassionate expression now as it did then.

  Morales gave me a once-over from head to toe. “I’ll get you a proper disguise. Stop by the church tomorrow before you head out here.” I could read displeasure on his face as clearly as though the words were written there. “You’ll have to walk a roundabout course. These people may live on the fringes of society, but they’re eagle-eyed when it comes to their territory. Keep a low profile and be very, very careful.”

  Sudden movement from beneath the viaduct shot a flock of pigeons over our heads, in a flurry of beating wings.

  I ducked and realized I had no idea what I was in for.

  “I will,” I said.

  Chapter 7

  Ron Shade

  I watched the sun creep up, turning the gray sky bright pink as I was finishing my morning run. The heat of the day wouldn’t start for several more hours, and I hoped to be on my way downstate by then. The Bayless questions revolved in my mind as I approached “Miss Agony,” the last of the three hills I covered in my five-mile runs. Even though I wasn’t quite back to fighting form, I knew I couldn’t let my roadwork lag. Plus, I’d been running so long that it was part of my routine. Everyone has them. Like brushing your teeth or going for a run or punching a bag. Something I went to for comfort as well as conditioning. And Bayless had to have them, too. A man might fake his own death, change his identity, dye his hair, and grow a beard, but his old routines would eventually reassert themselves. I had to figure out what had made Bayless tick, while he was still Bob Bayless. Then I’d have a key to track him.

  The hill took more out of me than I would have liked. I’d lain off the running after the big fight mainly because my legs had been so sore. Getting kicked about sixty or seventy times on the thighs by a two-hundred-and-sixty-pound man will do that. But the work today was feeling better. Still not one-hundred percent, but getting into the high eighties. Another few weeks and I’d be back.

  At the house I showered, dressed, and made sure the cats had enough food and water. I glanced at my clock. Almost six-thirty. If the ride down to Peyton took me the better part of four hours, I’d arrive down there at a good time to look around a bit. In addition to talking to the officer who’d handled the traffic crash, I also wanted to see the coroner. Maybe he noticed something about the body that would help. It was a fishing expedition with my chances of success about as remote as winning the Lotto, but I reminded myself that I was getting paid either way. And since it was Big Dick doing the paying, I wanted to make sure I was thorough. Very thorough.

  I watched the steady stream of cars going north on I-57 as I basked in the good fortune of a reverse-commute. Everybody was heading toward the city, while I had the flat farmlands of southern Illinois ahead of me. I took it easy on the drive, conserving gas and stopping for coffee on the way down. “America runs on Dunkin’,” all right. When I got off at the Peyton exit I immediately sought out Main Street only to discover that I was already on it. The town was typically rural based: a few really neat old churches, a couple homey-looking restaurants, three gas stations, a theater with one of those triangular marquees advertising the latest movie with plastic block letters. Down the block, a bright new McDonald’s had a lot full of cars. It took me about ten minutes to get the lay of the land, and I pulled into the County Sheriff’s Office, which was a fairly modern building. It was built out of solid red bricks and the tall framework of a metallic antenna crisscrossed its way skyward from the side of the building. A huge replica of the sheriff’s police patch on framed plywood decorated the wall next to the front entrance. It consisted of yellow block letters spelling out FURMAN COUNTY SHERIFF, and displayed a tan outline of the county inside a large circular design. Some juvenile joker had taken a red Magic Marker and scrawled a capital CK after the first two letters of FURMAN COUNTY. It was somehow reassuring that assholes grew down here, just like they did up in my neck of the woods.

  From the looks of it, Furman County was shaped like a backward L. Sort of a long slender stalk pointing north from a solidly shaped horizontal base. I wondered where, in those dimensions, the Bayless crash had occurred. On the other side of the door a red, white, and blue wooden sign structure advertised the sheriff’s name on a prominent rung, along with a listing of other elected officials. Down near the bottom rung it said Thaddeus Brunger, Furman County Coroner. I wondered how popular you had to be to be elected to that position down here. Maybe it was a case of the electorate just continuing to dance with the one that brung ’er.

  All jokes aside, I made a mental note to see him, too. I parked the Beater in one of the spots marked “Visitors” and went inside. The small foyer opened into an expansive room, with several offices on each side. Beyond that a big Plexiglas window housed a group of uniformed personnel, each sitting in front of a radio console. I went to the window and waited. Presently, one of the operators, a middle-aged woman, got up and sauntered to the counter. Her nametag said Mildred and the silver wire from her headset antenna stuck up in a sloping angle. Another silver wire jutted out from her earpiece positioning a tiny mic in front of her mouth. She pressed a button on an intercom, and her distorted voice asked if she could help me.

  “I hope so,” I said, flashing her one of my high -wattage smiles. “I’m trying to get in touch with one of your officers.” I took the traffic accident report out from the file and shoved it through the slot at the bottom of the window. She took it, looked at the bottom section and walked over to a desk. She paged through a thick sheaf of papers, paused, and came back to me.

  “That’s Deputy MacMahan,” she said, slipping the report back through the window. “He doesn’t start till three o’clock.” Even though Peyton was way north of Kentucky, her voice had a noticeable twang. Almost Southern sounding. The farther south you went in Illinoi
s, the more pronounced the resonance got.

  “Do you think it would be possible to get ahold of him for me?” I tried the high watts again. “I’m down here from Chicago and was hoping to talk to him about that accident. I’m doing an investigation for the insurance company.” She seemed hesitant, and I quickly added, “I’d really appreciate it if you could help me out, Mildred.” People usually like to hear their own name said back to them.

  She compressed her lips as she debated, then told me to wait. Sitting down in front of her console section, she became less visible to me, but it appeared as though she was typing something on a keyboard. The people behind the Plexiglas all spoke in tones inaudible from my side of the window. I could see Mildred was talking into her microphone, squinting slightly when she glanced at me. I tried to figure out what she was saying by watching her lips but gave up. Finally, she got up and came back to the space on the other side of the window.

  “I called Deputy MacMahan at home,” she said.

  I smiled. “And?”

  “And he says he’ll be glad to talk to you.” Her mouth flashed a quick smile of her own. “As soon as he comes on duty at three o’clock.”

  “As soon as he comes on duty at three o’clock.” The woman’s smart-ass comment kept ringing in my ears. Sixty thousand comedians out of work, and I had to get her. Maybe she was the one who kept busy with the Magic Marker in her spare time.

  I glanced at my watch as I finished off another glass of iced tea at the small restaurant. Eleven- forty-five. Still a wait before I could talk to the deputy. At least, with the lengthy June sunlight, I could probably get a look at the crash site, if he was cooperative.

  The restaurant was a quaint little place, with a long counter and wooden booths and tables. I’d taken one by the window so I could appreciate the scenery. The pace seemed a lot slower down here than what I was used to up in Chicago. Several men had met at one of the booths and discussed everything from farming, to the high gas prices, to the weather, to more farming. From the sound of it, they had it a lot harder than I did.

  I had the file spread out in front of me, trying to figure my next move. Since I was down here until at least three, I figured I’d make a stop off at the coroner’s office. I’d asked Miss Comedian Central where that was, and she told me “The Brunger Funeral Home on Main Street.” I’d opted to grab an early lunch and ponder. I was actually getting good at it.

  I remembered that a Dr. K. Boyd had performed the autopsy, which fit my estimation that the coroner wasn’t an MD.

  K. Boyd? Up in Chi-town, the use of just a first initial usually connoted a female. I wondered if that was the case here. Small-town doctor, a woman . . . Probably needed the extra cash in a place like this. With all the farmers down here they probably had more use for a veterinarian than an MD. At least I assumed she was an MD. Maybe she was both. Hopefully, she’d have a light schedule and could see me.

  I decided to try Mr. Brunger first. See what I could find out from the official version. After leaving the waitress a substantial tip, using my credit card, of course, so I could bill Big Dick, I headed across the street to the Brunger Funeral Home. Except for the sign hanging from a metal rack in the front yard, the place looked like an older, large house. It was made of dark bricks and had a sloping roof that jutted out from a second story. A blacktopped driveway ran along the right side, extending into a parking lot in back. I estimated that it had been around as long as the old churches in the town, and a lot longer than the newer-looking sheriff’s office. The front sidewalk was very wide, and led to a set of double doors. I rang the bell and waited. No response. I tried knocking on the door. Still no response.

  “He ain’t usually there this time of day,” a craggy voice said from behind me.

  I turned. Across the driveway a white-haired lady sat in a rocking chair on the porch next door. There was a ball of pink yarn in her lap, and her fingers nimbly worked some lengthy needles as she spoke.

  I wasn’t wearing a hat, so I couldn’t tip it, which probably would have ingratiated me to her quicker. Instead, I smiled and stepped across the asphalt.

  “Good morning, ma’am,” I said, trying to sound like a city boy with manners.

  She nodded and continued rocking. A pair of ornately framed, and far from fashionable glasses were perched on an aquiline nose. “Morning? I don’t know where you’re from, young fella, but it’s afternoon ’round these parts.” Her fingers kept up their rote activities.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said, searching for a countrified metaphor. Something more down-home folk-sounding. “I got up before the rooster this morning myself.” I saw a hint of a smirk twitch her lips. “I’m down here from Chicago.”

  “I figured as much. Up before the rooster, my ass.”

  It was my turn to smile. “I was hoping to speak with your coroner. You have any idea when he’ll be available?”

  Her chin jutted toward the street. “He owns that feed store down a ways. Usually don’t come to the home unless he has a customer.”

  I looked down the block.

  “The big metal building,” she said. “Just past the McDonald’s.”

  “I see it. Looks like a nice place.”

  Her lips pursed into a frown. She stopped the needle action and set everything down on her lap. I watched her fingers dig in the pocket of her dress. “Not for the horseshit prices he charges, it ain’t. All he’s concerned about is getting money from feeding your stock and burying your body.” She took out a big, brown cigar and bit off the end before sticking it between her lips. “The man’s a damn bloodsucker, if you ask me.” She twirled the end of the cigar in the flame of her lighter, drawing and puffing. “A real shitbird.”

  “He must have some friends around here if he’s the county coroner.” I decided to try for the countrified humor one more time. “Unless, of course the county would rather just dance with the one that brung ’er.”

  Her stare was rueful. The tip of the cigar glowed and she blew out a prodigious cloud of smoke. “Like I said, feeding ’em and burying ’em. The son-of-a-bitch ain’t nothing like his father. He helped build up this town.”

  What I was learning about Mr. Brunger wasn’t inspiring a lot of confidence in his judgment. But still, that might prove valuable in building a case for an exhumation. I took out my pad and pen and stepped closer to the porch railing.

  “Would you mind giving me your name and address?” I asked, poised.

  She exhaled another gray cloud. “What the hell for?”

  “Well, for my report.” I tried another smile. It was bordering on desperation this time. “In case my boss wonders who I was talking to down here.”

  She looked down over the tops of her glasses at me and squinted, the cigar tucked into the side of her mouth. “Talking about what?”

  I gave a half cough, half sigh and reached into the file. After paging through the sheaf of papers, I came across a head shot of Robert Bayless taken from his DMV file. I held it toward her. “About him. Look familiar?”

  Her eyes narrowed, sending crinkly lines down her cheeks. “Not particularly. Who is he?”

  “His name was Robert Bayless. He was in a traffic accident near here.”

  “That one got himself burned up over on the highway?”

  I nodded. “You remember the accident?”

  “I remember my fine neighbor having a tizzy fit about Doctor Boyd wanting to send some body parts to Springfield.” She paused and smirked at the memory. “Kept him from signing the death certificate.” She lowered her voice a few octaves. “ ‘Slowed the process down,’ he said.”

  “Where’s Dr. Boyd’s office at?”

  Her chin jutted in the opposite direction of the feed store. “See that big yellow house down that away? That’s hers. Her father had his practice in it, too. Thank God she came home and took over when he passed.”

  It didn’t look that much different than the other frame houses on the street. Just a humble country doctor with a limited practice a
nd no shiny sports car. I hoped the fact that she’d sent out tissue samples was an indication of her competence. Of course, that could work against me if she’d done a real thorough job. I turned back to the old woman and thanked her, still holding my poised pen. “And now, ma’am, your name please?”

  She stopped her knitting and glared at me, then said, “For your boss?”

  I nodded, freezing my face in the most sincere expression I could muster.

  She scrutinized me some more, looked toward the Beater, then smirked again. “If I tell you, will your boss at least give you a better car?”

  This damn town was chock-full of comedians. I wondered if she had a Magic Marker under all that yarn.

  Brunger’s Feed Store looked fairly new and sort of out of place along the rural town’s main street. But the bright red-and-yellow McDonald’s next to it also seemed misplaced. Both buildings were set apart from the rest of the block, like they’d been recently added. I wondered what quaint old structures had been torn down in the name of progress. Both parking lots were full and I parked the Beater towards the back and walked to the front doors. The rear of the building had a big overhead door where a couple of men loaded bales of hay into the bed of a truck. The building itself was all corrugated metal, like an oversized shed. Probably not much need to keep it insulated in the winter. I pulled open the front door. An attached bell jingled and a jowlly looking guy with an oversized gut and jet-black hair, too dark to be natural, peered up at me. He had oversized sideburns, too, and looked sort of like an Elvis impersonator gone to seed. Late Elvis, definitely. His face quickly jerked into a smile and he asked, “What can I do you out of?” The accompanying laugh a few seconds later. Kind of a long exhalation of foul breath with his lips curled back from his teeth. The teeth didn’t look all that natural, either.

  “I’m looking for Mr. Thaddeus Brunger.”

  He licked his lips and said, “Well, you found him,” and gave another of those hissing laughs, after which he extended his hand. “Don’t believe I caught your name, though.”