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Canaan Camp Chapter Four A Life Changer
May 12, Canaan Camp
It was a close day with both temperature and humidity in the nineties, and without the hint of a breeze.
Paget leaned on his cant hook, sweat streaming down his face and bare, hairless chest. His jeans were soaked, and his
eyes burned in the heat. Tossing hay suddenly didn't seem like such a bad idea. Neither did leaving.
He dug the cant hook into the side of the crooked, knotty section of tree trunk, putting his weight into the shaft in
a vain effort to roll the log over. "I need some help
over here, fella," he said. A deeply tanned young man wearing
a sweat soaked sleeveless T-shirt slipped his own cant around the butt of the log. Together the two of them rolled the
misshapen trunk down the gentle slope to the spot where it could be skidded out and hauled down to the sawmill to be cut into
rough lumber.
Earlier in the morning the teenager had told him that the Church produced almost all of its needs, but traded with the
heathen world, for the cash to buy things impossible or inconvenient to make at Canaan Camp.
"That baby was a tough one, Brother," said the young man as he leaned on his cant catching his breath.
"She was a real bitch," replied Paget before he caught himself. "I mean---I'm glad they're
not all like that." The young man smiled at the profanity,
which is not what Paget expected. He was still trying to get a handle on these people. While going back to wrestle
another log down the slope, he picked angrily at the blisters he had already worn on his hands.
39.
"Cal!" Suddenly Paget realized that
the Cal being called for was him. Down through the trees he saw the Stick Man struggling up the slope toward
him.
"Are you hard of hearing, Cal?" "I've
got a little deafness in my right ear," he lied. "Got a head cold too. My ears are a little stopped
up."
"Well, you can put your gear away and put on your shirt. Father Joshua wants to see you."
"Why?" "He wants to talk to you
about becoming his aide," said the Stick Man, his tone saying he was less than thrilled with the idea.
40.
What's wrong, little girl?
Getting jealous? thought Paget in amusement.
But Bobby Lee was in a good mood. It would be good to get away from the logs and the heat, but if the old faggot
touched him it would be the last time he touched anybody.
Blue Creek,
May 13 Richard sat with feet propped
on the gallery railing. Down to the northeast white limbed sycamores stood like sentinels marking the course of the
spring fed stream called Blue Creek. A south wind had stiffened, carrying Gulf moisture into the heat and promising
thunderstorms. Their lightening and wind didn't bother him. In fact, he liked their raw display power and had
a farm boy's love for the relief they brought to parched land and summer heat. He
went into the kitchen as soon as the coffee had brewed, closing the screen carefully on his way back out so as not to awaken
Jill. Beyond the creek steep oak and hickory covered hills rose, azure tinted from the moisture-laden air of daybreak.
A gray, shear rock cliff rose hard against a curve in the stream about three quarters of a mile away, its top garlanded with
dark green cedars. Jill didn't have to work today, and he didn't go in until two. Maybe they'd go fishing over
there at the bluffs later in the morning. As the wind chime
at the corner of the deck jangled, he drank in the beauty of the Courtois Hills along with his coffee. His momentary
contentment, however, only exacerbated his guilt. The hills were a perfect fit for him, but not for Jill.
How does she really feel about being stuck out here away from everything she had planned? he wondered.
They were only here because he was clinging to the pathetic shadow of a dead dream. He should have never let her
do it.
Road deputy! he thought in disgust. That's what your law enforcement career is, Buddy.
He made up his mind to give it a year just to get it out of his system. Then they would move on to something more
realistic.
She finishes the year at the junior college, and we're out of here. A full professorship. A prestigious
university. She's got a bright future if you just get out of her way. Although
it was the right thing to do, the manly thing, just thinking about it brought the familiar sinking feeling. He became
angry with himself.
41.
Depression is nothing more than being self-centered and weak. It's self-pity and nothing else.
He got up in disgust and went to the kitchen for a refill. If
a guy has enough work to do, he doesn't have time for that crap, he assured himself, as he picked up the folder he had
started on Bobby Lee Paget to take back out with him. He balanced
his cup on the arm of his chair and began leafing through the file. His boss had humored him when he asked permission
to gather a file on Paget, telling him that he would have to do it on his own time, not the county's. Marked Tree had
surprised him by faxing the FBI profile of the Riepe family's killer, evidently feeling that since they had IDed Paget they
it was of no further use. The fruitless manhunt suggested that
the killer had hitched a ride or obtained another vehicle and was no longer in the area. That was probable, but Richard
wasn't quite sure. The man could easily be holed up in one of the many isolated houses and trailers in the area, maybe
even in Hawthorn County, although he would have had to backtrack from Mountain View.
He picked up the summary of Paget's criminal history. The twenty-six year old man's record began at the age of
seventeen. The extent to which his criminal record matched the Marked Tree profile impressed. Robert (Bobby) Lee
Paget's nine years of adult life had been spent either incarcerated, on probation, or on parole. Twice assault charges
brought by women had been dropped, but he did time for unlawful restraint, assault, and attempted kidnapping, serving three
years of an eight-year sentence. Sought two years ago for a series of burglaries in rural northwestern Arkansas, he
had disappeared, resulting in his parole being revoked. He closed
the file and let it drop to the weathered wood of the deck. A
pileated woodpecker---a "wood hen" in local parlance---cackled in the scrub oaks just beyond the stony
stump lot that served as their woodland lawn. The eastern Ozarks' virgin forest had been harvested in the 1890's lumber
boom. A hundred years later the second growth forest still wasn't the same, but the lumber camps and boomtowns had withered
to place names, and the once-numerous turkeys were coming back. The deer population had swelled to road hazard and garden
pest level.
Although he once loved it, Richard could no longer bring himself to hunt. He preferred fishing the clear, gravel-bottomed
streams wending through the overgrown hills locals insisted on calling mountains. Whether it was solitary fishing as
he waded the small creeks, or floating the larger streams, he couldn't remember ever having a bad day on the water.
If it weren't for what he would be doing to Jill, he could spend the rest of his life here.
"Am I interrupting your reverie?" asked Jill as she scooted a lawn close.
"A welcome interruption," he replied, noticing her cut-off jeans as she folded her long, tanned legs
beneath her.
Her sleep tousled coppery hair fell in enticing disorder over the T-shirt she had slept in. He never tired of looking
at her.
42.
Covering a yawn delicately, she looked out over the rail. "You
were up early," she said. "Did you sleep well?" "Fairly
well. How about you?" "Fine," she
said, chickening out of what she had been determined to tell him. "I wish we could go somewhere today, but you
have to work, don't you?" "Odd you should
say that. I was thinking the same thing before you came out. See that cliff over there. That's where the
creek runs. I don't have to go in ‘til two. What say we go fishing over there this morning?"
"If I just swim or sunbathe will that hinder your fishing?"
"The fish might mind, but I wouldn't." She
noticed the open folder. "Will you bring that?" she asked. "Of
course not. Why would you even ask?" "You
seem to have it with you all the time." "Well
not today. And while we're on the subject, I've been thinking this morning about what we're doing here. What say
we call it quits after this year and get you into that doctoral program at Auburn. You need to get on with your career."
"But you want to be a policeman, Richard. We both know that. I'm teaching and---"
"I wanted to be in the FBI, Jill. Not this. This isn't police work. It's being
a security guard out of doors." The truth was that, as horrible
as it had been for both of them, he thirsted for the excitement he had experienced discovering what Mic Boyd had done.
And he had found a missing child, although most of that was dumb luck. What he'd had was a juvenile dream. It
was dead and it was high time he buried it once and for all. "And
don't tell me that teaching at a second rate junior college is what you want."
"Maybe not forever, but it is for now." "Teaching
history in Podunk? Your aunt didn't send you to the States for that. You should be a professor in a real
university---live in a place more at the center of things. Not here."
"I like it here." "You're in exile,
Jill."
"Richard, I do not care about money, and certainly not about being somewhere that everyone thinks is important.
We live in the sort of place people go to---" "Get
away from it all," he finished. "If it weren't for me, you wouldn't be here."
"No. I'd be dead, Richard." "Jill,
you don't owe me anything." "What
a horrible thing to say. I didn't marry you out of gratitude."
"No. But you gave up everything for me. Besides being selfish, it was unrealistic of me to try
to hold to a . . . to a dead dream." She studied
him with narrow eyes. "I love us, Richard.
We are so good together until you do this. I want us to be happy, and all we have to do is let it happen. Why
can't you do that?" "You're not being realistic,"
he said.
She got up and went to the railing
43.
"I hate this self-pity!"
she said over her shoulder.
He
got up and tried to encircle her waist. She moved away. "I
love you and I want to be with you. Why isn't that enough?" "Oh,
Jill. It is," he said. "I just don't want to make you do something that you don't want to do."
He approached her again but refrained from touching her. "What
if I call in Pete? Maybe he can pull my shift this afternoon and we can spend the whole day together---that is if you
still want to." Instead of his fishing tackle, Richard
carried their picnic lunch as they set off toward the bluff through the tangled underbrush and saw briars armored with jeans
and high-topped boots. At the creek they decided to wade the knee-deep water barefoot with rolled up jeans, but underestimated
the depth and reached the cliff-sheltered gravel bar soaked to the waist. They changed into swimsuits and spread their
wet clothes on the rocks to dry. Down in the sheltered hollow heat radiated from the rock face creating a comfortable
microclimate, but the water was too cool for swimming. Water seeped in sun sparkled runnels along a line of permeable
strata on the face of the bluff---life blood for the spring fed creek. Jill
spread a blanket beside a dry log half-buried by the spring floods as Richard knelt, absently tossed pebbles into the murmuring
water.
"Come," she said patting her blanket. "Lay your head in my lap and relax."
"It'll put your legs to sleep," he warned. "As
feather brained as you are? I doubt it," she said as he came over and lay down.
He closed his eyes, pressing his cheek to the bare skin of her abdomen, breathing in the aroma of tanning lotion while
she lightly fingered his hair. He could have lain there forever, and had almost fallen asleep when she spoke.
"When do you think we should start a family?" "When
we get settled," he said. "Isn't that what we planned?" She
didn't answer for a moment. "How settled
do they have to be?" she finally asked, biting her lip afterward. "I
don't know. Right now having a kid is the last thing we need."
When she stopped moving her fingers through his hair, he opened his eyes. Tears glistened in the lashes of her
tightly closed eyes. "What's wrong, Babe?"
he asked.
She shook her head. The knot in her throat wouldn't let her speak. "I've
. . . ruined things," she finally managed. He bolted
upright, spun around, and took her by the shoulders. She wouldn't meet his eyes.
"You're pregnant?" he asked. "I
. . . maybe."
He jumped to his feet. "This changes everything," he said.
He dropped to the gravel again. "You're certain?" "I
am . . . there are other possibilities, but . . . I think so." "How
long have you known?" "For a couple of weeks now
. . . I thought . . . maybe. Are you angry with me?"
44.
"Angry?" he
asked in genuine amazement.
Jill
drew her legs beneath her. "What are we going to do,
Richard?"
"Start a family, obviously," he said, obviously delighted.
"I don't understand. A moment ago you said that a baby was the last thing we need right now."
"Hypothetical," he explained with a wave of his hand. "I thought a baby would complicate things,
limit your options, short circuit your career." "It
will."
"We've handled bigger stuff." "We
are barely able to make expenses now, Richard. Where will we get the money?"
"We'll make do, Babe. It might be tough, financially, but if you decided that now is the time then that's
good enough for me." A thought suddenly occurred to him,
but he dismissed it. She read the play of emotions on his
face.
"What is it?" she asked fearfully. "Nothing.
I know you didn't do it for the wrong reason---you know, to fix things between us."
"Do we need things fixed, Richard?" "Well,
I might need fixing, but not you. I'll stop the . . . the wallowing in self pity thing now that I've got something to
think about other than myself. By the way, when did you decide we should get pregnant?"
Now Jill had something else to worry about, something totally unanticipated during all her worry about telling him the
last few days.
"Richard, would it hurt terribly if I were wrong?" "I'd
be disappointed, but you're not wrong." He laughed in delight. "My lady is going to have my baby."
He sat and drew her to him. "When did you stop taking the pills?"
After moving to Blue Creek they had gone over a month without making love. She had resigned herself to a state
of near abstinence, and so had made the common sense decision not to refill her birth control prescription. She had
been without them for two weeks when he suddenly found the urge again, but she had never refilled the prescription.
Since he was fine with her taking sole responsibility for what had happened, she decided to lie to him rather than chance
ruining the way things had gone. "You'll be angry,"
she said. "I forgot to take my pills a couple of days, and then panicked when I thought about it. Then I
just . . . decided that I wanted to have a baby. I should have asked you."
"I'm glad you didn't," he said. "Why?"
"Because I can be really stupid sometimes." She
stiffened.
"If I had suggested it, you would have objected?" "I've
done stupider things." "Then it's---"
"The second best thing that ever happened to me," he said. "The first being when you agreed
to be my wife." "I insisted on it
as I recall," said Jill crying and laughing at the same time.
"See what I mean about trusting your judgment?"
He squeezed her. "I am so happy, Jill."
45.
When it was time to start home, Jill stood at the water's edge, bracing for the chill of crossing.
"Here," he said, handing her his clothes. When
she took them he picked her up without warning. "Put
me down!" she said. "Just hold our clothes above
the water until I get us across," He took only two steps before
losing his footing, and with a barely muffled curse, he fell sideways. Jill came up spluttering, gasping, and laughing.
"You dropped me in the water!" "Excellent
observation. Are you okay?" "Fine," she
said lunging to grab at the clothes that were drifting downstream. "That
may have not been a good idea," he said as he hurried after them. "Excellent
observation, husband." When they got home they showered together
and made love. Afterwards, Jill snuggled against him, wanting to talk of the future, to dream aloud, and give voice
all her suddenly bright hopes, but Richard had fallen asleep. Even that buoyed her. She was sure that he had finally
turned the corner---that the past could be left behind now. She
listened to the steady rhythm of his breathing and slow beating of his strong heart beneath her cheek, and she sighed contentedly.
He murmured, shook his head, sighed, and lay still. Then his heartbeat accelerated, he drew a deep breath and held it.
His cramped arms burned. Something wet and hot was on his back and neck, stinging like a swarm of wasps.
His head rubbed painfully against another as he tightened the strangle hold. With an audible snap he felt death.
The man went suddenly mushy and heavy, slipped from his grasp, sagged forward, and rolled face up. Accusing eyes locked
on his own. Not Mic! It was a boy dressed in rags. Beyond him, a scarecrow woman in a loose fitting brown
dress repeatedly pointed a bony finger at him. He couldn't speak Somali, but he knew what the boy's mother was saying,
and that it was true. "Richard! Are you all
right?"
He gradually became aware of where he was. "Oh,
I'm fine. Just a . . . a dream." "About
the boy soldier again?" she asked reaching out to stroke his shoulder. Of
course she knew. He wished he had never told her about it. "I
don't . . . can't remember," he said.
May 14, Blue Creek Community
College Jill had come
in early to finish grading the tests she had put aside in favor of the picnic. "Welcome to Bedrock" signs
festooned the maple lined drive. The administration had finally embraced the nickname started by the kids and made popular
during the national tournament at Hutchison where the basketball team had made a respectable debut the previous fall.
Blue Creek Community College became BC College, Stone Age U., and finally Bedrock. The disparaging
term had been turned around, and was now used with pride.
46.
"Every school needs a little swagger," Richard had told her.
Thinking of him made her think of the baby, and she smiled because everything was going to be all right.
Fifteen minutes into the work, she was so deeply into the task that she failed to notice that someone was at the open
door of her office. "Mrs. Carter?"
A gangly young man stood uncertainly in the doorway. "Oh,
Shane," she said putting aside an essay test. "What can I do for you?"
He extended an open spiral notebook awkwardly. "Could
you look this over for me?" "Of course,"
she said, immediately turning her attention to his cramped handwriting. "Come in and sit down," she said absently.
He sat stiffly and watched nervously as she examined his writing. At first he tried to interpret each nod of her
head, blink of her eye, and indrawn breath to anticipate her judgment of his effort. Gradually, however, he became more
interested in her profile, the way she moved, the cut of her hair. He suddenly realized how young she was. His
essay all but forgotten now, he was unable to resist examining her while she was distracted. It made him feel like a
peeping Tom, so he tried to stop, but his eyes were drawn irresistibly back. Jill
sensed his unease, and did her best to dispel it as she limited the number of corrections she suggested. She decided
that she intimidated the awkward boy. Some men resented intelligent women, and some resented beautiful ones. She
had learned early that some found the combination of the two insufferable. Her intuition failed her this time, however.
She may have intimidated Shane, but he was more than willing to suffer her.
Canaan Camp
Canaan Camp was Hell. Paget was
sure of that. The old man was driving him crazy. When Joshua wasn't trying to instruct him, he was telling
holly roller stories. There was no getting away from the crap. And there was nothing, absolutely nothing
to do in the damned place. Without a television, or even a radio, it was like being in solitary. Even that was
better than the old man's babbling, but fortunately, the old faggot went to bed nine.
At eleven his restlessness drove him out into the night. I need
a smoke. I need a drink. He kicked at the grass. I need to get the hell out of here is what I need.
But he had nowhere to go where they wouldn't be looking for him. Patience.
They'll get tired of looking. As soon as the news media gets bored with the Riepe's story, the cops will go back to
shaking down dopers and hassling whores. He decided
to give it a month, and then either go back to Fayetteville or maybe Oregon. It
was a hunting night, with moonlight sharp enough to cast concealing shadows and illuminate unwary prey. A light breeze
blew from the direction of the single women's barracks. An interesting
place if things were different, he thought dispiritedly as he wandered down the road.
A voice. He couldn't make out words, but it was definitely the furtive tone of someone meeting in the dark.
Paget listened, but didn't hear it again. About to believe that he had imagined it, he heard a foot scrape on gravel.
He ducked off the road, and into the shade of a large tree. Pressing himself to the trunk, he watched silently, curious
as to what would bring other people out at a time the sheep in the compound would no doubt call an ungodly hour.
A teenager walked by leading a girl by the hand and talking quietly but urgently.
47.
Good for you kid. Go get that little honey pot. At least someone
in the damned place is normal.
He
waited until they were well up the road, before following. He couldn't risk doing anything, but at least they could
entertain him. The road shone starkly in the light of the full moon. Fearing that they might spot him if they
looked back, he walked close to the edge of the road to blend in with the darker patterns of the bordering weeds. They
hurried on, however, without a glance back. He stalked them
to an old barn atop a small hill off the road, pausing to watch them disappear inside. A moment later he went up the
hill slowly. The barn stood out starkly against the starry sky, its door, a black hole. Paget let them get settled,
knowing that they'd soon be too busy with each other to notice him. If they did, he had it covered. He'd scold
them for their evil ways, and send them running back to where they were supposed to be.
". . . because I want to see you, Bev," said the boy, sounding all of fifteen.
"Let's go over in the shadows," an equally young female voice said plaintively.
"No one else can see you. Please, do this for me." He
slipped into the barn and stood in the shadows watching as the boy fumbled with the girls clothes.
"Michael, this isn't really wrong, is it? I mean---"
"No," assured the boy, "We love each other and we're going to get married. We'd already be
married if they'd let us." "Shhhh," she
cautioned.
"Your right. We shouldn't talk so much. The sound really carries," he said.
They always talk too much, kid, Paget said to himself. The
moonlit girl lay on her back, while the boy worked at her blouse. Paget's racing pulse throbbed in his temple.
Compulsion wound him like a tightening spring. He felt for the butterfly knife, and inhaled. Running the possibilities
through his mind, he calculated the outcome. You could do it, Bobby
Lee. They won't be missed until morning. The girl lifted her
hips, and pushed down her jeans. Paget tried to calm his breathing. Hide
them under the hay bales afterwards. But they'll find them.
Then what?
It could take days! You're the new guy. If you're
still here when the police come they'll make you for it. Take
a car and leave tonight. And then what? They're looking like hell for you in Fayetteville, and probably in Oregon
too. Until they get tired, you got nowhere else to go. The damned money just won't last long enough.
Paget wavered, tempted to just say "To hell with it" and step over the edge.
She's just asking for it, he thought, irresistibly drawn to what he knew was a dreadful mistake.
The boy stripped the shirt from his trunk, and stood over the prone girl. Paget licked his lips in anticipation.
It would be so easy---so satisfying. And so
stupid, Bobby Lee. He slipped back outside, and stood uncertainly
in the shadows listening. That wouldn't do, not if were going to remain in control. He began walking down the
hill toward the woods, neither knowing nor caring where he was headed. A root caught his foot as he reached the deep
shade where the trail---it couldn't be termed a road---turned into the woods. He cursed under his breath as he regained
his balance. Now that he was out of hearing distance, the temptation was lessening.
Walking along the moon dappled trail leading through the woods, he kept running through what he might have done, and
decided that he'd either have to find a woman of his own here pretty quickly, or find some way to leave the damned place once
in awhile. The trail suddenly emerged onto another gravel road. Not sleepy, and unwilling to go back past the
barn until they had gone back, he decided to follow the road to the left. Feeling sorry for himself, wishing he had
cigarettes, something decent to drink, something interesting to do, he just walked.
To hell with this! he said to himself after he had gone what must have been two miles without seeing anything
but dust cloaked head high weeds. All you've done is give yourself a long way to walk back. Then he noticed
a gatepost standing darkly just off the road to the right up ahead. Mildly interested in what the gate led to, he decided
to walk just a little further. A cable stretched from one
upright railroad tie to another barring access to a bushhogged lane. A weathered sign warned trespassers of prosecution
should they enter. He stepped over the three-foot high cable and went in. About a hundred yards ahead, he crested
a rise and saw what the owners of the property were warning people away from. Row after row of silver sided buses were
parked end to end, filling a shallow valley. "Well,
at least you didn't waste your whole damned night, Bobby Lee," he said sarcastically. "You found you a bus
bone yard."
As he retraced his steps, deciding against all common sense that he'd do the kids if then were still at the barn when
he got there. But, of course, they were gone.
Farley Switch, May 15
A scream penetrated his closed windows. Richard braked quickly and then hit the shoulder for a U-turn. The
couple in the Walk On Inn parking lot were oblivious to his arrival. The point and counterpoint of the debate seemed
to be that "he wasn't going to treat her that way" versus "she wasn't going to get away with it."
Alcohol had lubricated their tongues, but had done little for their wits. The only unusual thing about the verbal fracas
was that it was occurring at one in the afternoon. Richard hoped
his mere presence would dampen the argument if not the passions. Before he got there, however, the man suddenly grabbed
the woman by the arm and slapped her, snapping her head around. In a continuous motion he backhanded her. When
the overweight man drew back for a punch, Richard caught him by the neck, stuck a leg behind his knee, and put him to the
ground. The man fell heavily, hitting his head on a section of exposed bedrock. It stunned him, but didn't knock
him out.
As the man groaned and blinked his eyes, trying to figure out what had hit him, Richard rolled him over and cuffed him.
After he had him safely tucked away in the back of the cruiser, he took the woman's statement. The situation unfolded
as something other than the domestic dispute he had thought he was witnessing. She was a hostess at the Friendly.
Richard knew from the reputation of the place that her duties probably included services a little more personal than
taking orders and bussing tables. Several rooms over the tavern were rented out for naps, all in the interest
of being solicitous to tired customers, you understand. The place was also rumored to be an occasional source
of pot and perhaps methamphetamine. According to the woman, the
man owed her some money, and refused to pay it. When Richard asked what the money was owed for, she quit talking.
Shug met them as they came up the courthouse steps. "What
we got here, Carter?" "Assault, Sheriff,"
he answered.
The handcuffed man and the sheriff exchanged meaningful looks, and then Shug cleared his throat. "Go on up
to my office, Justin," he said. "I'll be up directly." The
man smirked at Richard before going inside. Shug cinched up his pants and walked down to the parking lot motioning Richard
to join him. The Sheriff stood silently, apparently studying the six or seven impounded vehicles on the lot.
"Do you know who that is in there?" he said finally. Richard
glanced at his note pad. "He's Justin Hall." "Right.
His daddy's Harlan Hall." Richard had a feeling he was
going to be raked over the coals for arresting someone he shouldn't have. He was disappointed, though he reflected that
he shouldn't be. He wasn't a kid anymore and he should know by now how the world worked. Still, it rankled.
49.
"So he's someone the usual rules don't apply
to?" he said.
He wished
he hadn't said it as soon as the words were out of his mouth. Shively
turned abruptly, scowling. He checked what he was about to say, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly before continuing.
"No. We don't have two sets of rules. But that man's family is trouble. They own
about half the land in the southern part of the county and a lot of people are beholding to them. That kid you arrested
is a spoiled brat. The old man's bailed him out of trouble his whole life."
He sighed.
"Look, Carter, I got an election coming up in the fall, and I don't need to make an enemy of the old man.
So I'm not exactly overjoyed about this. But that's not your problem. Tell me what happened."
"He was slapping this woman around over in the parking lot of the Walk On Inn, and I put him on the ground.
Then I cuffed him and brought him in. That's all there was to it." Who
was the woman?" Richard looked at his notepad again.
"Betty Barnhart." "Lord! A whore!"
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