“Twenty-one guns,” Hank said, then grabbed his stomach. “I don’t feel so good.”
The deputy from the second car walked over, picked up the deer rifle and put it inside his cruiser.
“Hey,” Hank said. “Tell ‘im to give dat back.”
“Let’s go,” the first deputy said. He was smiling. “And I thought it was going to be a quick shift-change.”
“Oh my God,” the voice said through the little speaker by the doorway. We were in the driveway tunnel under the courthouse. I’d forgotten what county we were in, but I didn’t want to ask just yet. Also, I was trying to think of which lawyer would be best to call.
I looked up to see a camera panning down toward us.
“Yeah,” Deputy L. Rice said. “Sheriff, this is our one man wake-up call.”
“Well, tell him to come right on in. And welcome.”
The door in front of us buzzed. Deputy Rice pulled the door open and motioned us inside.
I turned to look behind us. Julie and Dingo were in the Suburban parked behind the Sheriff’s patrol cars.
I shrugged at her. She shrugged back.
Maybe she wouldn’t have to wait too long. I hoped.
Hank was in a holding cell inside the jail. I gave the booking officer as much information as I could while I chatted with the County Sheriff. He’d identified himself as Randy Thornton, and had shaken my hand as if he was about to ask for my vote. Small town elected officials can’t usually afford to make people overly upset with them unless it’s unavoidable, and that extends even to prisoners under arrest. We were out-of-towners, however, so I was both surprised and pleased by the Sheriff’s demeanor.
“I’m glad you got that rifle out of his hands before my boys got there, Mr. Travis. No telling what could have happened otherwise.”
“He means what could have happened to Mr. Sterling,” Deputy Rice said. “But I’ve never had to shoot anybody yet. Knock on wood.”
The three of us there-the booking officer, Deputy Rice, Sheriff Thornton, and myself-all started at the sudden WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! sound that came from the holding tank.
“Let me OUTTA HERE! You HEAR ME!” Hank’s muffled voice reverberated off of concrete and steel.
“Your friend,” Sheriff Thornton began, “is a hell-raiser. A bit old for that, ain’t he?”
“Yeah,” I agreed.
My eyes detected movement from upwards and to my right. On one of the closed-circuit surveillance monitors there was someone walking up to the back door of the jail. Someone familiar.
“I’ll be dipped,” I said.
It was Agent Cranford. In the camera lens-distorted background behind him I could make out Agent Bruce standing by the Suburban talking with Julie.
“Better let him in,” I said, just as the buzzer went off.
“Who is he?” Sheriff Thornton asked.
“You don’t want to know,” I said.
“Sheriff, if you’ll let these fellows go, I’ll be responsible for them.”
“I don’t have a problem with that,” he said.
We were in a small conference room off the booking room. In the corner was an old fingerprint roller and a leaning stack of ancient parking meters. The quest for space is an ever-present problem for small town governments. The room was concrete cinder-block covered with lime-green paint. It gave our faces a sickly pallor. Then again, I wasn’t feeling so good myself. I could have used some breakfast to go with the cup of coffee I had in my hand.
“I just like to know what’s going on in my county,” Sheriff Thornton finished.
“Sheriff,” Cranford said. “First, I need to know something. Don’t take this the wrong way, alright?”
“Shoot.”
“Are you a close friend or relation to Archibald Carpin?”
Sheriff Thornton laughed. I looked at Cranford. He was a little too seasoned to take offense. He waited for the laughter to subside.
“What’s so funny?” he asked
“Heh! Nope,” Sheriff Thornton chuckled. I’m not remotely related to that coke-snortin’, rum runnin’ fool. No sir. You and Mr. Travis and that aging hell-raiser in my drunk tank in there come to my county to do something about that idiot?”
Agent Cranford looked at me. “As far as I can tell,” he said, “Mr. Travis, Ms. Simmons and Mr. Sterling are here because of a little girl named Jessica. And because of two million dollars.”
My heart skipped a beat. He hadn’t mentioned anything about the money before.
“Is he serious?” Thornton asked me and rubbed his rough-hewn, meaty hands together.
“Like a heart attack,” I said.
“Okay. That explains them,” he said. “What about you?” He pointed his finger at Cranford. “Why are you here?”
“My partner and I are here to shut down a certain moonshine operation that has been going on in this county since the late 1920s.”
“Oh. That.” He yawned. “Every few years a couple of fellows like you come through here. They go out there, look the place over. Then they leave.
“Yep,” Cranford said. “I know. I’ve read and re-read the files. But-” he pulled a piece of paper out of his jacket and handed it to Thornton. Thornton looked it over and handed it to me. I scanned over it quickly. There were three columns. The first column heading was ‘Date’, and underneath it was a long list of dates from 1930 to four years ago. The second column was a list of offenses, most of them the same thing: “ULUT alcohol transport”.
“What’s ULUT?” I asked.
“Unlicensed, untaxed.”
The third column was numbers. Dollar amounts.
“Those are just the ones we’ve interdicted-caught,” Cranford said.
I did some quick math. The total was millions of dollars.
“This case,” Cranford said. “It’s my last hurrah. I retire in two months.”
“So where does the wrecking crew here come into play?” Sheriff Thornton asked and gestured towards me.
“Our government cannot run without the assistance of its people.”
“What the hell kind of an answer is that?”
“The only one I have to give, right now.”
“All right. All right.” Sheriff Thornton stood up. He leaned across the table as Agent Cranford and I stood up. He shook both our hands.
WHAM! WHAM! WHAM!
“Please,” he said. “Get that crazy, gun-toting alcoholic out of my jail.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Agent Cranford followed us back to the motel. Julie and I helped a snoring Hank out of the car and into his room. Dingo followed us in.
Hank needed a bath. I wasn’t his Momma, so I decided to wait and see if she showed up to bathe him. He was a friend, but I hadn’t signed up for that job yet.
“You two go get some breakfast,” Cranford said when I came out of Hank’s room. “I’ll stay here until you get back.”
“Uh. Thanks,” I said.
Julie waited until we were in the Suburban headed out of the parking lot before asking me: “Why do you trust those guys?”
“They sprung Hank out of jail.”
“Yeah, but what’s their angle?”
“I wish I knew.”
We had a late breakfast-that was more of a lunch than anything-at a Mexican Restaurant. The food was pretty good, but not as good as the Austin venues I was used to.
When we got back to the motel, Hank was still zonked.
Cranford and Bruce waved and drove away as soon as we unlocked our door.
“You’re right,” I said to Julie. “They’re pretty weird. Nice, but weird.”
Julie and I passed the rest of the day in each other’s company.
I kept expecting Hank to wake up. I kept expecting the phone to ring. I kept a watch out for light blue Ford F-150 pick-up trucks.
Night time.
We were back inside the hotel room, in the same bed. In the dark with her body pressed against mine, it was like we’d never left the room from the night before. The events of that day hadn’t even happened. We did things in the night that young people do in the back seats of their parents’ cars.