28. #2
police station, his face red with road rash from when she had tackled him, his wrists tied with a rope she had found in the
back of his stuffy, fetid van. That night, she had stopped dreaming of him, and her mother had reappeared.
Sitting back now, looking at her worthless searches, she tried to remember just how she had found Norman. Was it a truck driver
who had stopped to help him change a tire? A pastor who had offered him a meal? An emergency room nurse to whom he unwittingly
gave his real name? All of those things and more had occurred in her cases, and they all ran together now: a country as filled
with disparate facts as the swamp outside Alonzo Pettibone’s home was filled with trees.
Donny’s Car Repair was not far from the courthouse, in what remained of downtown Pickleweed. Most of the storefronts were
empty, dusty. She passed a defunct wedding dress shop, a closed haberdasher, and a laundry that looked to be limping along.
About the only industry that still seemed alive, she reflected, was that of incarceration.
She had added a printout of the probate document to her bag. With the copies of the poorhouse ledgers and the VHS tape, along with Mitchell’s employee file and witness interviews, it was getting pretty crowded in there.
Donny was expecting her—apparently Willa had called, or stopped by. Ruby knew that by now, the town would be buzzing with
gossip. Despite what people might think, this added a layer of safety to her work. People out to kill her were less likely
to do so if they knew that others were watching. It also helped with information. Most people, no matter how impassioned they
were by a case, were even more curious: They wanted to stand next to the one from the outside and learn more.
Donny was at his counter. Behind him was his shop, with derelict cars hanging on lifts. Another man was hard at work. Donny
had a beard, braided into a little tail and tied with a pom-pom, which she found unusual. His ears were dirty, but his eyes
were clear. She recognized him instantly as a kindred spirit. She couldn’t even say why. Maybe it was because he seemed close
to her age. She could imagine him in downtown Portland when she was a teenager, smoking clove cigarettes and cracking wise
outside the Metro Cafe on Broadway, where punk kids littered the streets. A sea of misfits and parentless kids.
“Howdy,” he said, friendly. “Willa said you’d be by. Need a car? I got a few I can rent.”
“The state only pays for budget cars,” she said, pulling an authorization paper from her bag. It was already smudged from
long flights.
His stained fingers went down the rates.
“Damn, girl, you don’t get paid much, do you?”
He had caught her hourly wage.
“Indigent pay for indigent defense,” she said.
“I make more than this,” he said. He seemed honestly affronted.
“That’s what the state pays defense investigators,” she said. “The defendant may be constitutionally entitled to an attorney, but they are not entitled to an investigator.”
“Then how they going to get an investigation?”
“They expect that from the police.”
“Ha!” He laughed, showing even teeth.
“You don’t think highly of the police here?” she asked.
He shrugged. “You’re in Georgia. Anyone who tells you we don’t got a complicated history with the police is lying.”
“I like your pom-pom,” she said.
“My daughter.” He smiled. “I let her do my beard for me. Got to make it look pretty, she said.”
“Tell her she does good work.” She turned to look at the cars he had parked outside. She wondered which one she would drive
away in. She guessed the Honda.
“Aren’t you gonna ask me about your case?” he said.
“Sure. What question should I ask first?”
In the shop, the man dropped a wrench and cursed. Ruby thought of the sheriff.
“Let me see.” He tugged his beard. “Ask me about Betty.”
“Okay. What do you know about Betty?”
“She was a nice lady. Most of us kids—well, kids back then—knew her growing up. She was one of those ladies always doing something.
The bookmobile. The free dental clinic. Always helping out. The kind that showed up with two casseroles at a wake.”
“Yet she had two businesses, too.”
His smile turned into a grin.
“That’s right. The motel and that gas station. People were always telling her to sell both. Time wasters, they were. That
motel still is.”
“Willa owns the motel now.”
“She used to help out there when Betty was alive. Pretty much managed it for her. She’s good people—Willa.”
“Good enough to tell on her brother, if it came to it?”
“You must mean Frank.”
“She got other brothers?”
“The less said about Frank, the better.”
“I’ve found that whenever people say that, it isn’t true. Those are exactly the times you should talk.”
“Frank? He’s a loser.”
Ruby found it unsettling how easily people excused each other. But then, she excused herself from a lot—especially the responsibilities
of friendship.
“There are losers, then there are losers,” she said.
“Yeah. That’s true. What do you want to know about Frank?”
“An address would be a good place to start.”
“No idea. Maybe ask Willa? On second thought, maybe not. That poor woman is saddled with him as a brother. She won’t help.
Did Frank do something?”
“He tried to run me off the road, and more. I don’t think the police here care.”
His eyes had widened. “I heard about that,” he said. “It’s all over town. But no one said it was Frank.”
“I’m pretty sure at least a few of them know,” she said. “I just pieced it together myself. He’s the brother of Willa, right?
She’s the owner of the motel. Inherited it from Betty. Why would he want to kill me?”
He stared at her for a long moment. “I don’t know. Honestly.”
“He mixed up with something he’s worried I’ll find?”
It had happened often enough that her arrival in a town was enough to make every criminal scurry for cover.
They worried she might uncover their crimes, too—especially if their crimes were related to the one she was investigating.
She had run into a lot of trouble this way on gang cases. And organized crime.
“Frank? I got no idea.”
“I ran his name. Didn’t find a record.”
He made a gesture with his hand. “Guys like him . . .”
“What do you mean?”
“I can see why you like your job now.”
She smiled.
“He’s an ass, all right. But I don’t know why he’d try to kill you, except maybe he’s upset that you’re trying to help the
guy who killed his cousin. That’s enough, isn’t it?”
“Maybe,” she said. “But considering how close we are to the execution, he could just wait.”
“It’s the principal of the thing, to a guy like Frank.”
“He has principles?”
He smiled a little.
“Tell me about this Frank. He work for others?”
“Frank?” he scoffed. “That man hates work.”
That wasn’t what she meant, and he knew it.
“How about Jerrod Tinsley?” she asked. “What kind of fellow is he?”
He looked away. The fun of the interview was wearing off, and he was beginning, like many, to think of courts and being called
as a witness.
“Homeboy but not,” he said, and she knew exactly what he meant.
“He has aspirations.”
“Sure.”
It was true of many district attorneys, she had found.
It was a fast track into any number of successful careers, especially politics.
While going into defense was the kiss of death for a political career, becoming a prosecutor was a blessing.
Play your cards right, and you could advance into the highest offices.
It was the career path she had seen often: law school to district attorney to state government to national government. Even the White House.
“You know what those aspirations include?”
“Don’t know the man personally. He’s not exactly friendly to guys like me.”
“Men here go to prison a lot?”
“Isn’t it true everywhere anymore?” he asked, looking tired. “So, what kind of car do you want? That Honda?”
“The Honda will do.”