Midnight Crossroad

37

Manfred (looking both ways) went back to his own place. He turned on the heat, a step he’d been putting off. It came on instantly, with that burned-air smell. But the gush of warmth was a relief. Manfred went into his bedroom and wrapped up in an old quilt of his grandmother’s before he went into the kitchen. He would not have thought he could be hungry, but apparently his stomach thought otherwise.

Though it seemed ludicrous, almost disgusting, he turned on his television. He couldn’t bear to think of what might be happening at Gas N Go. Creek and her father had to be going through another hell, as if they hadn’t suffered enough. And what would happen to Connor’s body?

While he ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, Manfred tried hard not to think of the terrible night the two remaining Lovells were enduring. Surely there must be some relief mixed in there, he thought. They’re free from the prison he put them in. And then he remembered he was supposed to be watching television, and he made himself concentrate on a rerun of The Big Bang Theory. For the first time, he saw Sheldon’s narcissism as monstrous, rather than amusing.

He settled back on the couch and presently sank into a kind of nearly sleeping dream. In this fantasy, Creek came to his door, told him she couldn’t handle being with her father anymore, asked him to take her in and make her his . . . and said that she forgave him for standing by while her brother was executed. When he made himself get up and stumble to his bed, it was past midnight.

He found out the next day that at about that time, Creek and her father had loaded everything they had of value into the old truck and had taken off.

He discovered they’d fled when Sheriff Smith stopped by. Shawn Lovell had left the sheriff a letter. At some time during the night, Shawn had dropped the envelope, inscribed “Arthur Smith,” into the old mail slot in the front door of the Antique Gallery and Nail Salon. Chuy had given it to Smith an hour previously.

“Now I’m going to tell you what he said,” Smith told Manfred. Manfred could only sit in his work chair and try to look relaxed.

“In this letter, Shawn Lovell tells me that he just discovered his son killed Aubrey Hamilton Lowry. He tells me that Connor had a terrible back history of mental problems. He asks me not to blame them for leaving after Connor ran away.”

“What?” Manfred said, startled. Whatever he’d expected, that wasn’t it. “He ran away?” Manfred said weakly. “Wow, that’s unexpected.”

Smith raised his thick blond eyebrows. “He says he doesn’t want his daughter to be tainted by the fallout from the crime and that Connor’s confession shocked them as much as anyone else. Shawn enclosed a note from the boy. Connor says he’s sorry for everything he’s done. He says he’s leaving because he couldn’t stand being around people who cared for Aubrey.”

In Manfred’s opinion, this was a mighty fine letter for having been written from beyond the grave. “And do you believe Connor wrote that letter?” It was clear to Manfred that he was not putting an idea into Smith’s head that wasn’t already there.

“Handwriting experts are comparing it to the boy’s signature, but so much schoolwork is done on computers now.” Smith shrugged. “Since we’ve got a confession that fits all the known facts and I found the boy’s killed before . . . I called a detective in the force where they used to live, and he remembered the case very well.”

“Are you going to look for him? Or for them?” Manfred asked. He made sure his face was composed.

“The answer would have to be, yes, we are going to look for Connor real hard. He’ll always be a threat to others unless he has a lot of serious therapy, and probably even afterward. For Shawn and Creek Lovell? Realistically, they’re not going to be our priority. We’ve got actual bad guys to catch.”

The sheriff rose to take his leave. “I guess I won’t be coming back to Midnight as often,” he said. “I had never had to drive out here before Aubrey went missing.”

“I hope you won’t ever have to again.”

“If you don’t mind me saying so, you don’t look too good.”

Manfred was certainly willing to believe that. “Yeah, I didn’t sleep well last night. Nightmares.”

“Every last person I’ve talked to here today has said the same damn thing,” Smith said. “You seem to be having some kind of epidemic.”

“Maybe because it’s the beginning of winter,” Manfred said absently, letting his gaze flicker over to the screen that waited for him. SandyStar521 was waiting to find out what her future held in store.

“I’ll let you get back to work,” said Smith, taking the hint. He moved, a little stiffly, toward the door. He seemed to be feeling the onset of winter himself. “You got a visitor.” Smiling, the sheriff nodded toward the front window. Mr. Snuggly was looking in, precariously balanced on the narrow sill.

“Let’s see,” said Manfred. “Maybe he wants to talk to you.”

The sheriff looked at him oddly, and Manfred realized there hadn’t been any touch of levity in his own tone. When Smith opened the door, Mr. Snuggly leaped down from the sill and arranged himself in front of the sheriff: looking up with his great golden eyes, tail wrapped neatly around his paws.

“What do you need, cat?” Smith asked, smiling.

Manfred held his breath. But his hope was dashed when Mr. Snuggly did not answer Smith out loud. That would have been pretty amusing, and Manfred needed to see something amusing.

Instead of speaking, Mr. Snuggly turned to start back to Fiji’s house. He looked over his shoulder to make sure Smith was following, and when Smith did not, the cat stopped to look back. Manfred didn’t know if the invitation included him, so he waited until Mr. Snuggly gave a tiny jerk of his head, a gesture that seemed to include him as well as the sheriff.

As they walked up to Fiji’s front porch, Manfred was sorry to see that the formerly abundant flowers were all but gone. Instead, there were pumpkins set out on either side of the door, carved into grotesque faces with considerable skill. Fiji had put out a sign reading, PUMPKIN CARVING WORKSHOPS! $25 INCLUDING PUMPKIN AND CARVING KNIFE!

She was working off her unhappiness.

When they entered the shop, Fiji had moved the two armchairs and the wicker table into the back of the house somewhere. She’d set up four card tables with folding chairs, covered the tables with orange plastic table coverings, and put cloth aprons and the pumpkin carving knives at four spots on each table. Since the glass case had been broken and not replaced, there was just enough room.

“I’ve got fifteen minutes before my class comes,” she said. “Else I’d ask you to sit and have a cup of tea or some soda.”

“That’s all right, I need to get back to Davy,” Smith said. “Ms. Fiji, I’ve got a few things to tell you.” He explained the content of the letters to her, much as he’d done for Manfred.

“Manfred, I’m sorry,” was the first thing she said.

Manfred shrugged. “They had to do it.”

“Why sorry for Manfred?” Smith asked.

“He was a friend of Shawn’s,” she said, without missing a beat.

“We both liked to fish,” Manfred said off the top of his head.

“Really?” Clearly, Smith did not think it likely from Manfred’s appearance that he’d ever been in a boat, much less put a worm on a hook.

“Sure, me and my grandmother went fishing all the time,” Manfred said truthfully. “She loved to be out on the water. Said it helped her clear her head. Of course, we ate the fish, too. Didn’t have a lot of money. What do you do for fun, Sheriff?” he asked, from sheer curiosity.

“As a kid, I liked to fish, too,” he said. “After I got into law enforcement, time for that got scarce. But I got interested in cold cases, and I belonged to a club that met once a month to talk about famous cases from the past. That was kind of relaxing. Now I work jigsaw puzzles.” He paused for a moment and returned to being the guarded, serious sheriff. “Ms. Fiji, is there anything you want to say to me about the Egglestons?”

Fiji opened her eyes wide. “I can’t think of a thing I want to say about them. Why?”

“I’m still curious about them all catching cold simultaneously. And they mentioned your name.”

“Mentioned me? That’s strange. I don’t think I’ve ever met the older Mr. Eggleston or his wife. I did see Price riding his motorcycle at poor Aubrey’s funeral. At least, I guess that was him.”

“All right. Sheer curiosity, I guess. Were you out that night? The night it rained so much?”

“Only an idiot would voluntarily go out in weather like that.”

He looked at her, taking her measure. He didn’t seem totally satisfied with the conclusions he drew. “Eggleston and his buddies did make quite a scene at the funeral,” Smith said. “I understand he went to Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton yesterday and made an apology. Said it was just a tribute gone wrong.”

“Hmm. Well, he did the right thing.”

“I’ll be on my way. I’m glad I got a chance to talk to you, Fiji.”

“Same here, Sheriff.”

He left, putting on his hat the moment he stepped outside. After the door shut behind him, Manfred said, “Give the guy a break, Fiji. You could have called him Arthur.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not in the mood to make stuff easy today. You want to help me carry in the pumpkins?”

“Sure.” He needed to stretch. Too much time at the computer desk.

“I really am sorry about Creek,” she said, when they’d finished. They both sighed when they heard a car pull into Fiji’s driveway. “They’re already starting to come.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry about Creek, too. But I guess this way is better for her. Where is Connor?”

“Where the two guys who came to beat up Bobo are, I guess,” she said, which was no answer at all.

“And that is?” He was impatient.

“If I can figure it out, you can,” she said, and then her first class member came in the door.

The following week, after everything had seemed to fall back to normal and the papers had stopped putting Connor’s school picture on the front page every day (due to his confession, the district attorney charged him as an adult), Manfred got a phone call. It was a number he didn’t recognize, but he got a lot of those, and he answered it without any expectation.

“Do you know who this is?” the voice said.

“Yes,” he answered, just as guardedly. It was Creek.

“We’re okay,” she said. “We’re north of where we were. It’s a lot colder! Hard to get used to.”

“Are you really okay?” He didn’t know what else to ask.

“As much as we can be. Dad got a job. Me, too. The same kind of work I did for Madonna.”

She was waiting tables.

“They treating you right?”

“Yeah, it’s okay. I miss you.”

“Same here.”

“I’ll try to call again sometime.”

“I want to hear from you.”

“I’m glad to hear your voice. I really am. Okay. Bye.”

“Bye.”

And then her voice was gone, and he believed he would never talk to her again. He thought again of the way her hair swung around her face, the smooth olive skin of her cheeks. He did not know if he should share this call with his neighbors or not. Somehow, he thought not. It seemed too personal and private.

Connecting Creek’s call with loss, he suddenly found himself punching in his mother’s number.

She was glad to hear his voice.