"Need someone up here to pass it down!" he called. Jack Burns shambled forward to the foot of the ladder and began to climb heavily. He had pulled on plastic gloves.
They made an effort to pass the tarp down folded, so nothing would spill from its surface, but it was cracking with age and a few pieces had to be retrieved from the bushes around the porch. Finally it was sealed in the garbage bag and placed in Lynn's car.
"Get whoever's on dispatch to call Morrilton Funeral Home to come out here. Tell them what to expect," she told the patrolman who'd helped hold the bag. He nodded and went to his patrol car radio.
Some of the men approached Lynn with a request, and after a moment's thought, she nodded. They converged at the foot of the ladder. One by one the men climbed up. We would hear the scrape of heavy official shoes, a silence as he peeked over the porch roof, then he would come down. The process would be repeated. While that was going on, Lynn and her two superiors congregated on the porch.
Shelby got up and arranged three chairs facing ours. Angel took Martin's chair.
He and Shelby stood on the side of the porch, where Angel and I could see them. This did not suit Jack Burns, I could tell, but he could hardly tell our husbands to leave when Angel and I were innocent bystanders to another family's tragedy.
"Could we move inside?" he asked, with as much geniality as he could muster. Angel had actually shifted in her seat preparatory to rising when I said, "I'd really rather not." She shot me a startled look and tried to settle back as though she'd never moved. I saw from the corner of my eye that Martin had blinked in surprise, and Shelby turned to one side to hide a grin. Lynn, Lanier, and Jack Burns all looked surprised, too.
I didn't want my house invaded.
"Well, it is a right nice day out here," Lanier said smoothly.
"How did you come to go up on the roof, Roe?" Lynn asked.
"Angel and I were playing Frisbee."
Lanier looked from Angel to me, comparing our sizes, and put his hand over his mouth to shield his smile.
"Angel threw the Frisbee, there was a gust of wind, and it ended up going up on the roof. I got the ladder, climbed up, got the Frisbee, and found—them." "You were there, Mrs. Youngblood?" Lynn asked politely.
"I was holding the ladder. I'm scared of heights." "What happened to your face, young lady?" Jack Burns asked, in tones of tender solicitousness.
"I fell on the gravel driveway, and I couldn't catch myself in time," Angel said. Her hands, resting on the arms of the chair, were perfectly relaxed. "And you, Mr. Bartell?" Lynn asked suddenly, swinging around in her seat to look at Martin. "Where were you when your wife went up on the roof? And Mr. Young-blood?"
"I was driving in from the airport. I got here while my wife was up on the roof," Martin responded. "I've been away on a business trip." "I was asleep," Shelby said.
"You're not working today?"
"I felt sick this morning, and didn't go in. As a matter of fact, I started feeling real bad yesterday afternoon, all of a sudden. I came home from work then and haven't been back since."
Shelby had neatly covered his sudden departure from work yesterday afternoon after Angel had called him. A "just in case" move, I thought. That was really all Lynn could ask us, given the circumstances. Perhaps it was even one or two questions more than she should have asked us, come to think about it.
"I'm taking my wife inside now, she's had a shock," Martin said. The police cars were vanishing one by one, but local people were beginning to drive by; someone had been listening to a scanner. A hearse from Morrilton Funeral Home pulled into our driveway, and abruptly I could hardly wait to be inside the house. There was no reason for me to stay, so Lynn nodded. Shelby and Angel came in with us. Martin pulled the drape cord in the living room and blocked out the cruising cars and the police and the funeral-home men. But nothing could block out the sounds from the roof.
Chapter Fourteen
I WANTED THE YOUNGBLOODS to go to their apartment. I wanted to forget about the mad ax-man and the bones on the roof. I wanted to watch an old movie on the TV, curled up on the couch with a big bowl of popcorn and maybe a beer. I wanted Martin upstairs after the movie was over. Or even earlier. But his agenda was different, I realized with a sigh.
He gathered us around the table in the kitchen.
"Now, what happened yesterday?" he asked.
I told him again, and then Angel began her part, her battered face more testimony than her words.
I slumped back in my chair sullenly. A night short on sleep and two days of violent emotions were taking their toll, I was very tired and very sick of crises. I wanted this all to go away, just for a little while, so I could make one of my slow adjustments. But of course I was thinking again of the man who had run at me, and now that I was too tired to be scared, I thought more of his face. While Martin was saying something about security to the Youngbloods, something about the bushes, I realized that there had been something faintly familiar about the man. I associated him with construction, building... . The phone rang. I went to the counter to answer it. Sally Allison wanted to know all about the skeletons on the roof; she was not in her "friend" mode, but in her "reporter" mode. I told her.
"You know," she said, "the police will call in the forensic anthropologist on this one. Did you know Georgia is the only state with a forensic anthropologist on the payroll? He's never been called to a case in Spalding County before! He'll be here tomorrow."
"Wouldn't it be funny," I said, "if it wasn't the Juliuses?" Dead silence. Then Sally laughed uncertainly. "Who else could it be, Roe?" she asked, as carefully as though she were speaking to a lunatic. I thought, If I were rested I could figure this out, something important. "Never mind," I said. "See you later, Sally." I hung up, and the phone rang again. I dealt with that call. Then another. Finally, I switched off the sound and turned on the answering machine.
I sat down at the table with the others, who had been conferring in low voices all this time.
"Roe," Martin began, and I knew he was about to tell me what to do. "Martin," I interrupted. "I think Angel and I will take a few days off and fly to New Orleans."
They all gaped at me. It was very gratifying.
"I know you need to go to Guatemala, and I expect Shelby needs to be getting back to work before the other people at the plant start to ask questions, so the best thing, with the phone ringing off the wall and all, would be for me—and Angel, since you think I need a bodyguard—to just go somewhere. And I think we might go to New Orleans. It's been years since I was there." Martin looked suspicious. But he said, "That sounds good, Roe. Angel, how does that sound to you?"
"Suits me," Angel said cautiously. "I can pack and be ready to go in thirty minutes."
"That would give me a chance to look into having some security installed here," Shelby said.
"I don't want to find an armed fortress when I come back," I told him. He did not even look at Martin; give him credit for that. "I won't do anything until I talk to you both," he said.
I nodded and stood up in a very pronounced way. The Youngbloods rose instantly and left for their apartment. Martin went to the living room and looked through the crack in the drapes.
"They're leaving," he said, not turning around. "All the police. The hearse has gone."
I waited.
He finally faced me. "Roe, I don't know what to tell you now. Nothing has turned out as we planned. I wanted a good life for us, I wanted to provide for you and take care of you and I never wanted any harm or upset to come to you. I thought I could keep the gun thing separate. I thought I would go to work at the plant and come home and you would tell me about whatever you were interested in and I would enjoy it and we would make love every night." Maybe I had sort of planned on all that, too.