“Whoa!” Vinny exclaimed. “This guy’s gotta go.”
Johnny couldn’t believe they were actually talking about getting rid of an assistant scoutmaster. He was scared all over again.
“After breakfast when he takes that little walk of his into the woods, we’ll follow him,” Danny said in a low tone as they all bent their heads in together. “We’ll jump him before he starts jerkin’ off or whatever he does out there by himself.” Johnny wondered what they were going to do after they jumped him, but nobody said a word about that.
Sure enough, after breakfast Daly headed into the woods, the boys following a safe distance behind. Danny had his hunting knife with him. About a quarter of a mile in, Daly stopped and sat on a fresh stump. Danny motioned with his hand for the others to creep forward. They spread out and moved silently towards the assistant scoutmaster, who seemed deep in thought. At Danny’s signal, they all ran at the same time and jumped on him. He was so surprised he didn’t make any move to defend himself. They had him on the ground in a second and Danny had his knife out, the flat pressed hard against the assistant scoutmaster’s throat with the sharp edge up.
“Don’t move or I’ll cut ya,” he said in a voice that was almost gleeful. He was daring him to move.
Daly looked into those malevolent eyes, saw the devil’s own smile on Dizzy’s face and felt the cold steel against his throat. He didn’t move a muscle.
Danny could see the fear in his eyes-felt it in his sweating pores.
“Me and the boys been wonderin’ what to do with you,” Danny continued. “They wanna report you. Me? I just wanna cut your fuckin’ dick off and stick it in your mouth.” He pressed the blade even harder into the assistant scoutmaster’s throat. “But we reached a compromise, so to speak. You’re gonna leave here today. Make up some fuckin’ excuse. You homos are good at that. And we ain’t never gonna see you again. Got that?”
Johnny was holding Daly’s right leg, which wasn’t moving at all. There was no struggle in the man. Johnny was wondering when and where this plan had been hatched. He’d been with Danny, Eddie and Mikey every minute since the previous evening and there had been no discussion. He looked at Mikey, who was holding the other leg, intently watching the proceedings. There didn’t appear to be any confusion in Mikey’s mind. Assistant scoutmaster Daly, his well-muscled body lying limply on the ground, slowly nodded his head up and down.
“That’s a good boy,” Danny told him, his left forearm pushing down on the man’s head. “Now we’re gonna walk away from here and you’re gonna stay right where you are for a few minutes. Got it?” Daly slowly nodded as best he could. “And then you’re gonna disappear.” Danny got up but kept the knife pointed at his prostrate victim. The other boys released his arms and legs and started to back away. Johnny expected Daly to jump up and overpower them with his massive frame but he just lay there passively until they were out of sight.
They laughed all the way back to the campsite.
“I can’t believe he just lay there and took it,” Eddie said.
“He was shittin’ his pants,” Danny chuckled. “You shoulda seen his eyes.”
“We shoulda checked his underwear for brown spots.” Vinny was laughing so hard he could hardly get the words out. “You scared me, Danny. I thought you were gonna cut him.”
“Were you?” Johnny asked.
“Hell no!” Dizzy replied. “Do you know what my old man would do to me if I cut that guy?”
“Maybe he’d understand ’cause of what happened?” Johnny said with questioning eyes.
“Nah,” Eddie cut in. “Danny’s right. Dad’s old school. Military. You report it up the chain. He’d beat Danny and then me and Mikey because we were the half-wits that followed him.” Danny, Eddie and Mikey started laughing again. Half-wit was their father’s favorite word.
Daly wasn’t at dinner that night but Danny still wasn’t through with it. He boldly walked up to the scoutmaster after they’d eaten.
“Where’s Mr.’ Daly?” he asked innocently.
“He had to leave. Some kind of family emergency,” the scoutmaster replied without looking up.
Danny turned towards the other boys back at the table and gave them the high sign. It was over.
Eight
The next morning, Friday, Wes and Del were in Clay Evans’s office to update him on the investigation. Clay looked at the two of them in their black-and-white getups and wondered what planet they came from. Maybe I should have stuck it out in Miami. I could be a partner by now instead of being stuck in this backwoods dive, conspiring with a pair of lunatics. Just then, adding an exclamation point to Clay’s inner rumblings, Wes put his thumb to one nostril and honked out the other. He wiped off the snot that was hanging from his face with the back of his hand. Del didn’t even notice. A few minutes before, Clay had been at that point in his daily musings when he almost had himself convinced this career move could still work out. When Wes ended his performance by putting his hands in his pockets, Clay gave up.
“How’d the interview go?” he asked halfheartedly.
“Great!” Wes replied. “The kid admitted he was there. Had a couple of beers with her. He said he got up to go outside because he was sick and fell over the coffee table and cut himself on the broken mug, which makes the blood and the fingerprints his. He says she kicked him out after he fell but he also says he could have killed her and just not remembered it.” That last part grabbed Clay’s attention. Wes wasn’t looking like an alien anymore.
“He actually said he could have killed her and not remembered it?”
“Yup.”
“Did you arrest him?”
“No. I let him go home.”
“You what?”
“His mother came to the station during the interview,” Del cut in. “She demanded that she be allowed into the interview and then demanded that we stop. I told her that wasn’t going to happen but that she could get a lawyer. A few minutes later Austin Reaves called demanding that we stop the interview.”
“Austin Reaves? Doesn’t he do wills?”
“Yeah,” Wes chimed in. “But he drinks at the Bass Creek Hotel. We figured the mother was in a pinch and this was the only guy she knew.”
Clay thought about that for a moment. Austin Reaves was probably just a Band-Aid. These people were dirt poor. They probably couldn’t afford a criminal lawyer for the trial, which meant they’d be stuck with old Charley Peterson, the public defender. Having Charley for a lawyer in a case like this was like playing Russian roulette with a fully loaded gun. Clay smiled for the first time that day.
“Did you take blood?”
“Yeah. It’ll take a few days to get the results. Maybe Monday or Tuesday. He owns a serrated knife, too.”
“I’m not following you.”
“The coroner told us the knife wounds were made by a serrated knife, you know, the ones with the grooves in them. Well, the kid told me he owns one. Told me where he kept it too,” Clay laughed.
“He really is stupid, isn’t he?”
“Yup.” All three of them chuckled.
“Wait for the results of the blood test, then pick him up. And call that reporter that you know, Wes. What’s her name?”
“Pam Brady?”
“Yeah, that’s the one. I want her to get a picture of this kid for the front of the paper to kind of remind our witnesses who they’re supposed to pick out in the lineup.” They all laughed again. It was an uneasy laugh, however, since one big problem was sitting in the middle of this case like an invisible white rabbit. Clay knew it was time to address that problem.