“Same as always, man. Just trying to find me a pretty girl, you know, one that’s got legs as long as a Monday.”
“And a skirt as short as the weekend?”
“It’s not as funny if you steal the punch line,” he said.
“How about you try being a little more specific.”
C.T. slunk back in his chair like a sulky child. “Is this a cops talk or a family talk?”
He always said it like that, cops, just so he could turn it into a four-letter word. It was unspoken between us, but we had a kind of silent agreement that I wouldn’t ever bust C.T. and in return he would give me a little information from time to time. It never amounted to much; the rare solid piece of info was always aimed at some new enemy of his and was more gossip than anything else, but so far it had suited us both fine.
“Let’s make this one a law-enforcement conversation,” I said. “The kind where I hear enough good intel that I lose interest in searching your pickup to see what I might find.”
“Man, you don’t have to put it so harsh as that,” C.T. said. He leaned farther back in his chair, stared at the ceiling, and rubbed his mouth. “Okay, let me think on that for a minute. What would Deputy Dan like to know, what would Deputy Dan like to know. Well, how about Lowell Adams is selling pills out of that new bait shop of his.”
“Not anymore. He got popped two days ago.”
“Shoot, really?”
I couldn’t tell if C.T. really didn’t know or was just feeding me stale information. He wouldn’t help me if he didn’t have to.
“Yes, really,” I said. “You got something worthwhile or not?”
“Now, just hold on,” C.T. said. “Don’t get so agitated. Give me a second to keep on thinking.” After a moment he grinned. “You hear Laurie DelMarr’s stepping out on Horace?”
“Why you telling me that for?”
“Man, I’m telling everybody,” C.T. cackled. “You imagine what’s going to happen when Horace finds out?”
I stood up. “It’s a shame you don’t know anything good,” I said. “Looks like I’m going to have to search that truck of yours after all. The barn too.”
“C’mon, man, if I don’t know, how can I tell you? I’m just small-time now; it’s not like the glory days, you know? I do a little business and it’s hardly enough to pay my rent.”
“Believe it or not, I’ve heard sadder stories than that, C.T. How about you join the rest of us and get a real job?”
“Hey, man, I look for work, like, every week.”
That was a lie. C.T. would rather have a crooked quarter than a straight dollar.
“If times are so tough,” I told him, “you ought to go work for Selby Cluxton.”
I said that to needle him, and also to throw out a little bait. But C.T. didn’t even nibble at the hook.
“Can’t see myself ever getting so desperate as that,” he said.
It wasn’t the answer I was hoping for. I looked around the room, at a loss for what to do next. C.T.’s place always depressed me, probably because it looked no different from the series of dumps we’d lived in growing up. Neither one of us spoke. I needed to figure out if he knew anything about the dead man in the Cadillac without letting him know what I’d found. I was about to press C.T. again when something caught my eye.
On the windowsill, next to two dead flies, was a half-empty pack of Chesterfield cigarettes. I walked over and picked it up with my pen, the way I’d seen actors on television do. Only one man around here smoked these.
“This mean what I think it means?” I said.
“Daddy always did have particular tastes. He come on over the other day, must have left them on accident once we got to drinking.”
“He’s back?” I said. “Since when?”
C.T. kicked his feet up on top of the wobbly coffee table and grinned. Did I mention he was taller than me too?
“Aren’t you supposed to know Daddy’s back?” he said. “Being the law and all?”
“We don’t keep track of all his comings and goings. He doesn’t rate that highly, not anymore.”
“Maybe not to the rest of them. But to you?”
C.T. was enjoying this a little too much. “All I’m asking is how long he’s been back,” I said. “And what you’ve been up to.”
“He’s been back, say, two-three weeks. He didn’t come calling till last week, though, wanted me to help him move some new furniture to where he’s staying now.”
“Should I be checking reports of armed robberies at furniture stores?”
“Nah, he bought it. It’s all legit.”
“Is that a fact?”
C.T. shrugged. “He’s going legit. For real.”
I shook my head. “You believe that?”
C.T. leaned forward, still grinning. “You can’t even say his name. You know what that tells people?”
“Is it better or worse than what it tells them when a grown man calls his father ‘Daddy’?”
C.T.’s smile dropped as quick and final as a man in a noose. “There’s no call for that kind of talk,” he said. “Listen, you want to search my property, then try and get a warrant. Until then, maybe you ought to get going, so I can get my beauty sleep.”
“It’s lunchtime.”
“You keep your hours and I’ll keep mine.”
“What’s he planning to do, now that he’s back?”
“If he told me, and you know that’s an if, how could I ever tell you?”
And there it was. So much for turning legit.
“I expect he’s wanting to take back what was his,” I said.
“Look at that,” said C.T. “And people say you’re not smart enough to make sheriff.”
I kept the Chesterfields, even though they’re not my brand. In fact, just the sight of them on the seat next to me turned my stomach. On the way back to town, I stopped at a gas station to buy my own. While I was there, just to check, I used the pay phone to call C.T. His line was busy. Two guesses who he was talking to.
My father, the man C.T. called “Daddy” and I called Lionel, had run the drug game in this county and the ones surrounding it for most of my life. He did until recently, that is, due to a two-year stretch he’d served in the penitentiary for beating the tar out of a mouthy college boy who was filled with more whiskey courage than good sense. Lionel had been released six months ago, and then he’d just gone and disappeared without so much as spending a single night in the one town he’d ever called home. Nobody knew where he went, though I had my guesses.
The beating he laid on that college boy, the beatings he used to lay on me, all the drugs he sold, and all the dirt he did to stay on top, none of that is what broke us up. No, only one crime of his really mattered to me. When I was six, my mother disappeared. Ran away, if you asked Lionel. Which, for lack of proof to the contrary, is what ended up in the official report. I know, because I’ve seen it. It was all lies. Problem is, there’s what you know is the truth and there’s what you can prove, and they’re only about as related as second cousins.
It’s embarrassing to admit, but Lionel was the reason I was a deputy. Before I was big enough to hold a gun there was some stupid notion in my mind as a kid of arresting him, leading him off in handcuffs. Not for what I knew he did to my mother — that case was long since ice cold — but for dealing, or beatings, or any of the other evils he did every day. That’s kid stuff, those fantasies, and I never told anyone about it, just kept it alive in my heart. Except then once I finally convinced the county to hire me, I was immediately taken off any case that might relate to him. Conflict of interest, they said; what would the voters think, relying on a son to investigate his father? It was funny, in a way.
When Lionel was released from prison a few months back and then disappeared himself, people figured he didn’t come back because they thought he couldn’t. See, Lionel never had a true second in command, unless you count C.T. It wasn’t my father’s way to share one bit of power. And when he was sent away to serve that two-year stretch, C.T. was in no position to hold on to what Lionel had built. It just wasn’t in him.