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    Hard Row dk-13

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    stood in the driveway. On the small porch, a young man in

      a UNC hoodie with a black-and-silver backpack dangling

      from his shoulder shifted his weight from one foot to the

      other as an older woman carrying a big red-and-green

      striped umbrella came out and locked the door behind her.

      He held out his hand and she gave him the keys. Both of

      them looked at the detectives suspiciously as McLamb got

      out of the prowl car and approached in the pouring rain.

      “Mrs. Stone?”

      “Yes?” A heavyset, middle-aged black woman, she

      wore a clear plastic rain bonnet over her graying hair.

      189

      MARGARET MARON

      “Colleton County Sheriff ’s Department, ma’am.

      Could we step inside and talk a minute?”

      Mrs. Stone shook her head. “Is this about my daddy

      again?”

      “Yes, ma’am.”

      “What is it?”

      “Ma’am—”

      “I’m really sorry, Officer, but if I don’t go on now,

      I’m gonna be late for work and they told me if I’m late

      again, they’re gonna lay me off. Whatever you got to

      say’s just gonna have to wait till this evening. I’ll be

      back at five.”

      “Where do you work? Maybe we could drive you?”

      She paused indecisively and the teenager jingled the

      keys impatiently. “Let ’em drive you, Mom. I’m gonna

      be late for school myself if you don’t.”

      “All right,” she said, but as the boy dashed through

      the rain to the Honda, she called after him. “You bet-

      ter be on time picking me up today, you hear? You not

      there when I come out, you’re not getting the car for a

      week. You hear me, Ennis?”

      But he was already backing out of the drive and into

      the street.

      “Boys!” she said, shaking her head. “Soon as they

      turn sixteen, they start climbing Fool’s Hill. Let ’em

      get to talking to their friends, flirting around with the

      girls, and they forget all about what they’re supposed to

      be doing and where they’re supposed to be. I believe to

      goodness he had more sense when he was six than he’s

      got now that he’s sixteen.”

      McLamb smiled, having heard the same words from

      his own mother when he first started driving. He mo-

      190

      HARD ROW

      tioned to Dalton, who drove up to the porch so that

      they wouldn’t get too wet. McLamb helped Mrs. Stone

      into the front seat and he climbed in back.

      “So what’s this about?” Mrs. Stone asked after she

      had told them where she worked and they were under

      way.

      As gently as possible, McLamb told her that the med-

      ical examiner over in Chapel Hill was pretty sure that

      her father’s hand had been detached from his wrist not

      by an animal, but by human intervention.

      Mrs. Stone turned in the seat and faced him, her face

      outraged. “Somebody cut off my daddy’s hand?”

      “Well, not the way you’re probably thinking. Mostly

      they say the flesh was so—” He searched for an inof-

      fensive word that would not sicken the woman. “—so

      degraded, that the hand probably pretty much pulled

      loose by itself when it was lifted, but there was a liga-

      ment that was holding it on and when the pathologist

      looked at the edges under a microscope, he could tell

      that it was definitely a recent cut. You’re his only rela-

      tive, right?”

      “Me and Ennis, yes.”

      “Can you think of anyone who might have wanted

      your dad dead?”

      Mrs. Stone shook her head. “The only person who

      couldn’t get along with him was my mother and she passed

      six years ago, come June. You can let me out right here,”

      she said and opened the door as soon as Dalton slowed the

      car to a stop in front of the motel where she worked.

      McLamb hopped out to hold the door for her. She

      handed him her umbrella and waited for him to open it.

      “Mrs. Stone—”

      191

      MARGARET MARON

      “I told you. I can’t be late today!” she snapped and

      hurried inside.

      “You didn’t ask for her alibi,” Dalton said, handing

      him some paper towels to mop the worst of the rain

      from his jacket.

      “Yeah, I know. Looks like we have to catch her this

      evening after all.”

      From Mrs. Stone’s place of work to Sunset Meadows

      Rest Home at the southern edge of Black Creek was

      just over ten minutes and Dalton parked the car as close

      as he could get it to the wide porch that ran the full

      width of the building.

      “Here’s good,” said McLamb. A slender man of

      medium height, he prided himself on staying in shape

      and usually looked for opportunities to take a few extra

      steps, but not when it was raining this hard. His navy

      blue nylon jacket had COLLETON CO. SHERIFF’S DEPT.

      stenciled in white on the back and he pulled the hood

      low over his face before making a dash for it.

      Dalton followed close behind in an identical jacket.

      Younger and chunkier than McLamb, at twenty-four, he

      was still kid enough to be excited by his recent promo-

      tion to the detective squad. “Provisional promotion,”

      he reminded himself as he took a good look at the facil-

      ity accused of letting one of its patients wander off to

      drown back before Christmas.

      “Don’t just look at what’s there,” McLamb had told

      him on the drive out. “Look at what’s not there, too.”

      Although certified and licensed by the state, the nursing

      home had begun as a mom-and-pop operation and was

      192

      HARD ROW

      a drab place at best. Built of cinder blocks, the utilitarian

      beige exterior was at least three years overdue for a new

      coat of paint. The shades and curtains looked sun-faded,

      and the uninspired shrubs that lined the porch needed

      work, too. Cutting them back to waist height would make

      them bush up at the base and would also allow anyone

      standing at the doorway an unobstructed view of the park-

      ing lot. As it was, the privet hedge was so tall and strag-

      gly that a casual observer might overlook someone leaving

      without authorization, especially if it was getting on for

      dark on one of the shortest days of the year.

      The porch was a ten-foot-wide concrete slab set flush

      with both the paved entrance walk and the sills of the

      double front doors beyond. Easy wheelchair access,

      thought Dalton, but also easy for unsteady old feet to

      walk off without stumbling.

      The fifteen or so rocking chairs that were grouped

      along the porch were worn and weather stained, but

      they were a thoughtful amenity for men and women

      who had grown up when porches were a place for social-

      izing, for shelling beans, for watching children play, for

      resting after lunch in the middle of a busy day. Indeed,

      despite the cool spring morning and the pouring rain,

      three of the rockers were occupied by residents swa
    d-

      dled in blankets from head to toe who watched their

      approach with bright-eyed interest.

      Not a lot of money to spread around on paint and

      gardeners, thought Dalton, but enough money to pay

      for staff who would help their patients out to the porch

      and make sure they were warm enough to enjoy the

      fresh air, even to tucking the blankets around their feet.

      The nursing home where his grandmother had recovered

      193

      MARGARET MARON

      from her hip replacement was beautifully landscaped

      and maintained, but there had been a persistent stench

      of urine on her hall and she complained that her feet

      were always cold. Somehow he was not surprised to fol-

      low McLamb into the building and smell nothing more

      than a slight medicinal odor overlaid with the pungency

      of a pine-scented floor cleaner.

      Immediately in front of them was a reception area

      that doubled as a nursing station. Long halls on either

      side led away from the entrance lobby with a shorter hall

      behind. Sam Dalton soon learned that Sunset Meadows

      Rest Home was basically one long rectangle topped by a

      square in back of the middle section to accommodate a

      dining room, lounge, kitchen, and laundry. Each of the

      forty “guest” rooms held two or three beds and there

      was a waiting list.

      “Does that sound like we’re careless and neglectful?”

      demanded Mrs. Belinda Franks, the owner-manager. A

      large black woman of late middle age, her hair had been

      left natural and was clipped short. She wore red ear-

      rings, black slacks, and a bright red zippered sweater

      over a white turtleneck. The sweater made a cheerful

      splash of color in this otherwise drab setting. She pos-

      sessed a warm smile but that had been replaced by a

      look of indignation as she glared up at the two deputies

      from her chair behind the tall counter.

      “Would people be lining up to put their loved ones

      here if they thought we were going to let them come

      to harm?”

      “No, ma’am,” Raeford McLamb assured her. “And

      we’re not here to find fault or put the blame on you or

      your people, Mrs. Franks. We came to ask for your help.”

      194

      HARD ROW

      “Like how?”

      “We’re now treating Mr. Mitchiner’s demise as a sus-

      picious death.”

      “Suspicious?” Her brow furrowed. “Somebody took

      that sweet old man off and killed him?”

      “Too soon to say for sure, but someone did disturb

      his body after he was dead, and we need to find out who

      and why. I know you and your staff gave statements at

      the time, but if we could just go over them again?”

      Mrs. Franks sighed and rolled her chair back to a

      bank of filing cabinets, from which she extracted a ma-

      nila folder.

      Standing with his elbows on the counter between

      them, McLamb looked in both directions. The front

      edge of the counter was on a line with the inner walls

      of the hall. Although he could clearly see the exit doors

      at the end of each hallway, there was no way someone

      behind the desk could.

      “I know, I know,” Mrs. Franks said wearily when

      McLamb voiced that observation. “We’re going to

      curve this desk further out into the lobby this spring

      when we get a little ahead so that anybody on duty can

      see these three doors. Right now, though, we had to

      borrow money to set up the monitor cameras.”

      She motioned to the men to come around back of

      the counter where a split screen showed the three doors

      now under electronic watch.

      “What about a back door?”

      “That’s kept locked all the time now except when

      somebody’s actually using it.”

      “But it used to be unlocked before Mr. Mitchiner

      walked off?”

      195

      MARGARET MARON

      She nodded. “You have to understand that we’re not

      a skilled nursing facility. Most of our people are just

      old and a little forgetful and not able to keep living by

      themselves, and we have a few with special problems.

      My first daughter was a Downs baby and we couldn’t

      find a place that would treat her right. That’s how my

      husband and I started this home. We wanted to take

      care of Benitha right here and have a little help once

      she got too big for us to handle. We still have a cou-

      ple of Downs folks, the ones who can’t live on their

      own, but mostly it’s old people who come to us. We

      see that everybody takes the medications their doctors

      have prescribed and we keep them clean and dry, but

      we’re not equipped for serious problems and we only

      have one LPN on staff. The rest are aides who have had

      first aid training, CPR, that sort of thing. We wouldn’t

      have kept Mr. Mitchiner here except that his family was

      always in and out to help with him and he had a sweet

      nature. Eventually, he would have had to transfer into

      a place with a higher level of care. They knew that. But

      this was convenient for now. His grandson could ride

      his bicycle over after school and his daughter could stop

      in before or after work.”

      “Who last saw him that day?” asked McLamb.

      “We just don’t know,” the woman said, with exas-

      peration both for the question and her lack of a defini-

      tive answer. “We don’t make visitors sign in and out.

      We want people to feel free to come in and sit with

      their loved ones, bring them a piece of watermelon in

      the summertime or some hot homemade soup in the

      winter. Put pretty sheets on their bed. Bring them a

      new pair of bedroom slippers. I think it makes them feel

      196

      HARD ROW

      good to know that they can pop in any time to check

      up on us because we have nothing to hide. It’s just like

      they were running in and out of their grandmother’s

      house, you know?”

      The men nodded encouragingly and Dalton said,

      “Sounds like a friendly place.”

      “It is a friendly place. You ask anybody. The only per-

      son with any complaints is Miss Letty Harper. She says

      our cook scrambles the eggs too dry, but that’s because

      she always wants a fried egg with a runny yolk. All the

      same, Ramsey’ll cook one like that for her if he’s not

      too jammed up.”

      She opened the folder and took out copies of the state-

      ments she and her staff had given back in December.

      “Mary Rowe. She’s due back any minute. She gave him

      his heart pills that morning. Then Ennis Stone. That’s

      his grandson. He just got his driver’s license around

      Thanksgiving and he took Mr. Mitchiner out for a ride

      and got him a cheeseburger for lunch. That man did

      love cheeseburgers. Then Ennis brought him back here

      and put him in his room for a nap. His room was down

      there on the end and Ennis usually came in that end

      ’cause it’s closer. He could park right next to the
    door.

      His roommate, Mr. Thomas Bell, says Mr. Mitchiner

      was asleep on the bed when he came back to take a nap

      himself; but he wasn’t there when he woke up.”

      “No one else saw Mitchiner that afternoon?” Dalton

      asked, thumbing through the statements McLamb had

      read back in December.

      “Not to remember. But it’s not like anyone would

      unless it was his family. He was in his own world most

      of the time, so he didn’t have any special friends here.

      197

      MARGARET MARON

      A real nice, easygoing man, but you couldn’t carry on

      much of a conversation with him. He kept thinking Mr.

      Bell was his cousin and he’s white as you are.”

      “Could we speak to Mr. Bell?” McLamb asked.

      “Well, you can,” she said doubtfully, “but he’s had

      another little stroke since then and his mind’s even

      fuzzier than it was at Christmas.”

      She led them into the lounge where several men and

      women—mostly black, but some white—sat in rockers

      or wheelchairs to watch television, something on the

      Discovery Channel, judging by the brightly colored fish

      that swam across the screen. In earlier years, Mr. Bell had

      probably been strongly built with a full head of hair and

      shrewd blue eyes. Now he was like a half-collapsed bal-

      loon with most of the air gone. His muscles sagged, his

      shoulders slumped, his head was round and shiny with

      a few scattered wisps of white hair, his blue eyes were

      pale and rheumy. Large brown liver spots splotched his

      face and scalp.

      This is what ninety-four looks like, Sam Dalton told

      himself. Pity and dread mingled in his assessment as Mr.

      Bell struggled to his feet at Mrs. Franks’s urging. We all

      want to live to be old, but, please, God! Not like this! Not

      me!

      The old man steadied himself on his walker and obe-

      diently went with them to the dining room where the

      deputies could question him without the distraction of

      the television.

      While Dalton steadied one of the straight chairs,

      McLamb and Mrs. Franks helped him lower himself

      down. He kept one hand on the walker though and

      198

      HARD ROW

      looked at them with incurious eyes as Mrs. Franks tried

      to explain that these two men were sheriff ’s deputies.

      “They need you to tell them about Fred Mitchiner,”

      she said, enunciating each word clearly.

      “Who?”

      “Fred Mitchiner. Your roommate.”

      “Fred? He’s gone.”

     


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