Page 125 of Hello, Summer
“Maybe so,” Conley said. “Okay, I was hoping you’d just walk me through it again.”
Margie folded her hands in her lap and closed her eyes. “It was way after midnight, and I fell asleep right here in this recliner. Sport needed to go outside to do his business, so I walked him outside, and he was kinda growling and straining at his leash. He can’t hardly see anymore, but his hearing is still sharp. After a little bit, I heard these men’s voices, yelling. And then a woman was telling them to stop. And then I heard car doors slamming and a car peel off.”
“And you said you didn’t hear the crash at all.”
“Didn’t hear a thing until Sport started yowling because the sound of the fire trucks and ambulance hurt his ears. That’s when I rode up there to see what had happened.”
Conley sipped her Coke. There was a scratching at the screened door, and Margie heaved herself out of the recliner.
“Oh, Sport!” she cried. “Bad boy! Not again!” She slammed the door, and the dog crouched outside, on the other side, whining.
The sick, sweet smell of rotting flesh wafted into the small room.
“He’s gone and found what’s left of that dead deer up in the pasture and rolled all around in it,” Margie said, holding her hand over her mouth. “He loves nothing better than getting stinky. Does your dog do that too?”
Conley’s mind drifted back to the ride she’d taken on the Ranger on her last visit and the deer carcass they’d spotted, with the vultures circling overhead.
“Margie, was that deer there before the night of the wreck?”
“I don’t know,” the older woman said slowly. “Let me think. No, I don’t believe it was.” She sighed heavily. “I can’t stand that smell. I guess I’d better see about getting the stink washed off.” She went into the kitchen and came back with a bucket and a bottle of dish detergent.
Conley followed her onto the porch, holding her hand over her own nose, choking back the urge to gag.
“What can I do?” she asked, her eyes watering.
Margie clipped a leash to Sport’s collar. “We’ll take him over to the side of the house and turn the hose on him. If you can hold him still, I’ll soap him up real good.”
The dog’s cloudy brown eyes were downcast in shame as Conley grasped him by the shoulders while he was hosed and soaped, rinsed and soaped, and rinsed again. Finally, Margie shut off the hose, and Sport shook himself vigorously, spraying water on both of them.
They took the dog back inside, and Margie toweled him off, scolding him good-naturedly.
“Margie, do you think maybe Robinette’s crash happened because he hit that deer?” Conley asked. “Could hitting a deer cause a wreck like that?”
“Oh, sure. My boys have both hit deer a couple of different times coming home on that road,” Margie said. Her face colored slightly. “Happens more often in what they callrut seasonwhen the bucks are chasing after does, but not always. A couple of summers ago, one big ol’ buck’s antlers came clean through my older boy’s windshield. He coulda been killed,” Margie said, shaking her head at the memory. “I been passing that doggone carcass twice a day, every day, going back and forth to my mailbox up on the road. Don’t know why I didn’t think about it causing that wreck ’til you asked just now.”
“And I don’t know why somebody from the sheriff’s office never came to talk to you,” Conley said. “Maybe if they had, they’d have spotted that deer.”
Before she left, she crouched down on the floor beside the damp, bedraggled dog. “Sport,” she said, cradling his muzzle between her hands. “If we’re right, I believe the sheriff’s office needs to swear you into the department.”
“Hi, Sheriff,” Conley said after she’d been ushered back to his office by the desk sergeant.
“Miss Hawkins,” Merle Goggins said, nodding. “Did I miss something? Did you have an appointment for an interview with me this afternoon?”
“I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d drop in and say howdy,” Conley said. She set the bakery box with the pound cake on his desk. “I even brought a hostess gift. Because I’m such a nice, proper Southern girl.”
“Since I know you were raised in Griffin County, I’ll give you the Southern girl thing,” Goggins said. “But I’m gonna call bullshit on nice and proper.” He untied the ribbon and lifted out the cake, breaking off a piece and tasting it. “For me? You shouldn’t have.”
“To be perfectly honest, I bought that to take to Vanessa Robinette. But the security guards at Sugar Key say she’s not accepting visitors. Or condolence cakes.”
“We’d like to talk to her again too, but she’s kind of hard to pin down these days,” Goggins said. “And I imagine you’re not real popular with her either.”
He gestured toward the chair opposite the desk. “As long as you’re here, you might as well sit down.”
“Can I have a hunk of that cake?” she asked. “I didn’t get lunch today.”
“Neither did I, come to think of it,” the sheriff said. “Want some coffee with that?”
“If you’re buying,” she said, surprised at his hospitality.
