The Guardians(36)
“I’m not interested in being a hero. I just cannot justify spending the time. Believe me, I’ve got enough to worry about.”
“Sure you do, but you can cooperate and make my job easier. I’m just searching for the truth here, Sheriff.”
“I don’t know. Let me think about it.”
“That’s all I ask, for now anyway.”
He takes a deep breath, still unconvinced and definitely uncommitted to the cause. “Anything else?”
“Well there is one other matter, another possible piece of the puzzle. Are you familiar with the death of Kenny Taft? Happened about two years after the murder?”
“Sure. He was the last officer killed on duty. His photo is hanging on the wall out there.”
“I’d like to see the case file without having to go through the Freedom of Information Act and all that crap.”
“And you think it was somehow related to Quincy Miller?”
“I doubt it, but I’m just digging, Sheriff. That’s what I do, and there are always surprises along the way.”
“Let me think about it.”
“Thanks.”
The fire chief is a potbellied, grizzled old veteran who goes by Lieutenant Jordan and is not nearly as friendly as the sheriff. Things are slow around the firehouse two blocks off Main Street. Two of his men polish a shiny pumper in the driveway, and inside an ancient secretary fiddles with paperwork on her desk. Jordan eventually appears, and after a brief round of forced pleasantries leads me to a cramped room with banks of 1940s-style file cabinets. For a moment he searches through history and finds the drawer for 1988. He opens it, flips through a row of dingy files, finds what I’m after and pulls it out.
“Not much of a fire, as I recall,” he says as he places it on the table. “Help yourself.” He leaves the room.
Back then, the sheriff’s office was several blocks away in an old building that has since been razed. In Ruiz County, as in hundreds of other places, it was not at all unusual to store crime scene evidence anywhere there happened to be an empty space or closet. I’ve crawled through courthouse attics and suffocating basements in search of old records.
To alleviate the shortage of storage space, Pfitzner used a portable shed behind his office. In the file there is a black-and-white photo of it before the fire, and a heavy padlock on the only door is visible. There were no windows. I estimate it was thirty feet long, twelve feet wide, eight feet in height. A photo taken after the fire shows nothing but charred rubble.
The first alarm came at 3:10 a.m. and the firemen found the shed fully engulfed. The fire was extinguished in a matter of minutes with nothing salvageable. Its cause is listed as “Unknown.”
As Jordan said, it wasn’t much of a fire. The flashlight found in Quincy’s trunk was apparently destroyed. No trace was found. Conveniently, the autopsy reports, witness statements, diagrams, and photos were safely locked away inside Pfitzner’s desk. He had what he needed to convict Quincy Miller.
For the moment, the fire is a dead end.
Chapter 19
I call Carrie and Buck once a week to check on them. They realize I’m not going away and are slowly coming around. I repeatedly assure her that she runs no risks by cooperating with me, and we establish a level of trust.
We meet in a coffee shop near Kingsport and eat omelets. She reads the affidavit Mazy has prepared, then Buck goes through it slowly. I answer the same questions about what happens next and so on, and after an hour of gentle cajoling she signs it.
In the parking lot, I give her a hug and Buck wants one too. We’re trusted pals now and I thank them for having the courage to help Quincy. Through tears, she asks me to ask him to forgive her. It’s already done, I reply.
My mother inherited the family farm near Dyersburg, Tennessee, my hometown. Mom is seventy-three and has lived by herself since Dad died two years ago. I worry about her because of her age, though she is healthier than me and not at all lonely. She worries about me because of my nomadic lifestyle and absence of a serious romantic relationship. She has grudgingly accepted the reality that starting a family is not one of my priorities and I am not likely to produce more grandchildren. My sister has given her three but they live far away.
She doesn’t eat animals and is sustained by the land. Her garden is legendary and could feed hundreds, and in fact does. She hauls baskets of fresh fruits and vegetables to the local food bank. We dine on tomatoes stuffed with rice and mushrooms, thick butterbeans, and a squash casserole. In spite of the abundance, she eats like a bird and drinks nothing but tea and water. She is fit and spry and refuses to take pills, and as she pushes her vegetables around her plate she encourages me to eat more. She is concerned about my lack of weight, but I wave her off. I hear this from others.
Afterwards, we sit on the front porch and drink mint tea. Little has changed on the porch since my convalescence many years ago, and we talk about those dark days. We also talk about Brooke, my ex. They were fond of each other and kept in touch for years. Mom was angry with her at first for leaving me during my breakdown, but I finally convinced her that our split had been inevitable on our wedding day. Brooke married an entrepreneur who has done well. They have four children, beautiful teenagers, and Mom gets a bit wistful when she thinks about what might have been. As soon as I get an opening, I move the conversation in another direction.