Page 84 of Hello, Summer
“How many?”
“Two? Three? I’m not really sure. At least two, anyway. Then I heard a car tear off outta there.Peeling rubber,my boys used to call it when they were teenagers.”
“Huh.” Conley thought about it for a moment, wondering if the fight had anything to do with Symmes Robinette’s wreck.
“Could have been just some old drunks pulling off the road to settle a score,” Margie observed. “There’s a juke joint bar up the road, and we get our share of drunk drivers coming from there late at night. Couple of years ago, I heard a commotion and found a fella had driven clear off the road, through my fence, and into the pasture.”
“I know the place. The American Legion bar,” Conley said. “My friend and I were there that night, headed home when we came up on the wreck.”
“I’ll be,” Margie said.
“You didn’t hear the wreck yourself?” Conley asked.
“Guess not. I got Sport back inside and went on to bed. My room’s at the back of the house, and I’ve got a window air conditioner that kind of drowns out everything else. I fell back asleep, and at some point—maybe an hour later?—Sport heard all the sirens from the fire trucks and ambulances, and he woke me up yowling at ’em.”
“You didn’t see or hear anything at all?” Conley repeated.
“Not until the fire trucks got there,” Margie said. “After that, I got dressed and took the Ranger up to the road to see what had happened.” She shuddered. “I wish I hadn’t seen what I did. That poor man. Did the police ever say what happened?”
“Not so far,” Conley said. “Have you told the sheriff’s office about hearing those voices, and the fight, earlier in the evening?”
Margie shrugged. “Hadn’t even thought about it ’til just now. They sent somebody the next day—a deputy—to ask if I’d seen anything that night, and I said I hadn’t.”
“What did the deputy look like?”
“Big ol’ fella. A white boy,” Margie said.
Conley was fairly sure she’d met that deputy the night of the crash and afterward too.
She scribbled her name and phone number on a page of her notebook, ripped it out, and handed it to her hostess. “I was on my way to the sheriff’s office when I stopped here earlier. Guess I’d better get going. If you think of anything else from that night, anything at all, could you give me a call?”
“Be glad to,” Margie said. “I’ll take you on back to your car now.”
As the Ranger bumped along the dirt track road, Conley spotted a pair of huge black birds hovering over something up ahead among the green stalks of sunflowers. Sport, again sprawled on the floor of the vehicle, raised his grizzled snout, sniffed, then went back to sleep.
“Ugh,” Margie said, pointing at the birds. “There’s a big ol’ dead deer over there. I’ll be glad when those buzzards pick that poor thing clean.”
Conley stared at the birds in mute horror. As the Ranger approached,she saw a lumpy brown form sprawled on its side. Two buzzards hopped on the ground, tearing at the corpse, while two more circled closer and closer in the air above.
She turned her head and averted her eyes. True, she’d been raised in a small Southern town, had seen her share of roadkill—although not since she’d moved to Atlanta—but the sight still filled her with revulsion.
Her phone buzzed in the pocket of her jeans. She took it out and glanced at the caller ID. The area code was local, but she didn’t recognize the number, so she disconnected and put the phone away.
“Here we go,” Margie said, pulling alongside the Subaru.
“Thanks for the ride and the cold drink,” Conley said, stepping down. She leaned over and scratched the old dog’s ears. “Bye, Sport.”
30
Conley was pulling into the parking lot behind the sheriff’s office when her phone rang. It was the same number that had just called, so she didn’t answer. But it rang again a second later from the same number, and this time the caller left a voice mail.
It was Michael Torpy, the young reporter at theBeacon.He sounded breathless. “Hey, Conley. It’s Mike. Grayson told me to tell you to call back. It’s important.”
She hit the callback button on her phone.
“Hi, Mike. What’s up?”
“Sorry to bother you, but I just got back from city hall, and I heard something I thought you’d be interested in, and Grayson agreed.”
