Midnight Crossroad

“I could tell you were an open-minded person,” Lemuel said, pale eyes on some small repair he was making to a piece of jewelry under a magnifying lamp. “Not likely to jump up and scream, ‘Oh sweet Jesus, another man is holding my hand!’”

Manfred laughed weakly.

“And I also believed that you would stay here, that you were not passing through, and that it was, therefore, the quickest way to let you know what I was.”

Manfred wanted to ask Lemuel if Olivia was his girlfriend, but in Lemuel’s presence he could see how silly that would sound. How intrusive.

“You are interested in Creek,” Lemuel said unexpectedly.

“She’s very attractive,” Manfred said cautiously. “I realize she’s younger than me, and I’m not going to, ah, initiate anything improper. But I would like to get to know her better.”

Lemuel’s eyes were almost white, now, when he glanced up. “She is a lovely child,” Lemuel said. “But I realize she is on the cusp of becoming a woman. If she decides to become a woman with you, you had better be damned sure she is fully aware and agreeable to every step of the process.”

Manfred replied with complete honesty, “I would never do otherwise.”

“Then we are not enemies,” Lemuel said. “And we may become friends, as I told the snake woman we were.”

“When were you born, Lemuel, if I can ask?”

“I was born in 1837,” Lemuel said. “My name was not Lemuel then.”

“A big adjustment, from then to now,” Manfred said, since it was all he could think of to say that wasn’t fatuous. But that was fatuous enough.

Lemuel discarded one tool and selected another. “That is true,” he agreed. “Good night, psychic.”

“Good night, vampire,” Manfred said. Since he’d clearly been dismissed, he went home.

20

Bobo was by himself the next morning when Sheriff Smith came in. Normally, he’d have taken Monday off and let Teacher work in his place, but he’d missed enough work, he figured. And he didn’t have anything better to do. He’d perched on the stool behind the high counter with a large mug of coffee. He was looking at a piece of jewelry that had been mended, apparently the night before, by Lemuel. The clasp had not worked on the brooch since it had been pawned twenty years before (Bobo had looked it up once in the ancient ledger), but now it did, and the brooch was in the display case that formed the counter, with a new tag on it in Lemuel’s curious handwriting. It read, “Twenty dollars. Will be called for.”

Bobo held it out, and the sheriff bent over the counter to look at it.

“If you have a lady in your life, she might enjoy something like this, Sheriff,” Bobo said. “If she’s old-fashioned.” The brooch was hand-painted with a picture of yellow flowers in a pale green vase, set against a gray-blue background. The frame was gold, set with tiny pearls.

Bobo wondered if he was about to be arrested. His heart pounded furiously, but he did his best to sound calm.

“I have a wife, my third,” Smith answered. “But she doesn’t like anything but modern stuff.”

“Not a traditional woman, then,” Bobo said.

“Not in the best sense of traditional,” Smith said. “But traditional in the way that means she expects me to provide everything for her while she sits at home on her butt.”

“Children?”

“No, she doesn’t even have children to look after,” Smith said. “I have a child by another marriage, but she lives in Georgia with her mom.”

“I guess you don’t get to see her often,” Bobo said. “That’s sad. What can I do for you today?”

Bobo found himself on the receiving end of one of Arthur Smith’s concentrated looks. Sheriff Smith didn’t blink much, so the stare was pretty effective.

“You can tell me more about your history with Aubrey Hamilton,” the sheriff said. The sheriff turned Bobo’s favorite chair to face the counter and settled himself in it. He looked quite at ease. “And by the way, she wasn’t shot. Someone wanted us to think she was, or someone was trying to put the blame on you. But we hired a specialist to look at the remains. The hole in her chest was not from a bullet.”

Bobo let out a long, unsteady breath.

“You don’t seem to be regarding me as a prime suspect in her death any longer,” Bobo said, manfully accepting the fact that the sheriff was sitting in his favorite chair. After all, the guy wasn’t arresting him for murder. He could have the damn chair. “And since I’ve already been into the police station once, you’ve searched my place, you’ve told me she wasn’t shot so I’m in the clear on the gun, and I have a lawyer on speed dial, I’m wondering what my status is now.”

“For the time period in which Ms. Hamilton—well, Mrs. Lowry—must have died . . . if we accept the testimony of Fiji Cavanaugh and your tenant . . . your presence in Dallas has been confirmed,” Smith said, sounding neither pleased nor displeased. “We could drum up a charge based on the fact that that gun was supposed to be here and secure, not laying on the ground by a river, but of course we can’t prove you were negligent enough to leave it there. It could have been stolen from here, though in that case your security needs some tending. Or your employees Lemuel Bridger or Teacher Reed could have taken it out. Unless more evidence turns up, you’re in the clear.”

“Wow,” said Bobo, as he absorbed this information. “Well, I feel relieved, of course.” He shifted around on the stool, not sure where to look.

“You don’t sound as happy as I expected.”

“I’m not happy,” Bobo said. “I loved Aubrey, and she’s dead. Not only did I lose her, but I’ve found out our whole relationship was a lie.”

“You believed everything she told you?”

Probably the sheriff was trying to sound neutral, but Bobo caught a hint of incredulity. “You seem to be a skeptical kind of man,” he said. “I guess in your line of work, that’s inevitable. I have a sister and a mother. They aren’t really pleasant women, or very smart . . . but they do tell the truth, as they see it. I know a lot of truthful women. And I guess I’m not conceited enough to imagine women making up elaborate schemes to meet me, like you say Aubrey did. My family’s had trouble enough in the past. I don’t need any more.”