November Mourns by Tom Piccirilli Read Free Book Online Page A

around him, and spotted her pale hand again. Reaching, trying to touch. It was time to get down to hearing whatever facts there were.
    “What killed her?” he asked.
    “The autopsy didn’t reveal any cause of death,” Dave told him.
    That stopped Shad, made him turn and cock his head. “The hell’s that mean?”
    “Exactly what I said.”
    “My father suspects she was murdered.”
    “I know. He spreads his suspicions high and low around town. But officially her death is listed as ‘by misadventure.’”
    Shad waited, counting the snap of his pulse to ten while Dave patiently influenced himself upon the world. “What?”
    “Death by misadventure.”
    It could get like this at the oddest times. He wished he had a cigarette—this was the kind of circumstance where a guy would take a drag, allow the seconds to roll by while he kept his lungs busy, then let the smoke out in a thin stream, everything cool and hip and effective.
    He fought to make his voice casual. Never any show of consternation, especially with someone that much bigger than you. “Dave, are you going to keep making me say ‘what the goddamn’ all day long? Or will you just lay it out?”
    “We don’t have any answers.”
    “I got that much.”
    “Misadventure means it’s an accident we can’t explain.”
    “And that’s an
official
report?”
    “Yes.”
    “You guys really cover your asses.” No matter how hard you tried, you’d never figure out the carefully constructed mystification of the justice system. “If you can’t explain it, then you don’t know she was actually killed.”
    “That’s right.”
    “Her heart simply stopped.”
    “That’s right.”
    “For no reason.”
    “That we can ascertain.”
    “So why’s my father say she was murdered?”
    Dave’s expression didn’t change but he settled back on his feet, and the slight adjustment in his body language let Shad know he felt a touch embarrassed. Not for himself, but for Pa. You had to have been around Dave Fox for most of your life in order to pick up on little things like that, and even then you wouldn’t know what it really meant.
    “She had a scratch on her cheek,” Dave said. “He takes it to mean she was attacked.”
    Shad searched the deputy’s face and came up empty. “And you do too?”
    “I didn’t say that.”
    “No, you didn’t.” Dave made you fight for everything, but his silence still gave him away occasionally. It was one way he could stay true to himself and still let people know what was on his mind. “Doc never cared much for moon, he’s more of a Jack Daniel’s drinker. I’d come across him on the lower banks while I was hauling whiskey, out cold with his feet in the water.”
    “He’s got bunions.”
    “I’d stop and pick him up, drive him home before he floated off. His wife always tried to pay me forty dollars when I’d bring him inside. I’m not sure how she arrived at that price.”
    Telling Dave pretty much what he thought of old Doc without having to come right out with it.
    But Dave Fox would never talk out against someone in authority, not even against the sheriff, who everyone knew was on the take. He drew his line in the sand and kicked the shit out of everybody to one side and let everyone on the other side slide.
    “Who found her?” Shad asked.
    “I did. She was lying there, like I said, as if she were sleeping.”
    “What made you think to look all the way out here?”
    “I looked everywhere. I started when your father called at about ten o’clock or so, and discovered her at four-fifteen in the morning.”
    “Don’t you ever sleep?”
    “No.”
    Shad thought about his sister so far from town, in the night, alone, surrounded by darkness. How different would it have played out if he’d been home? Maybe the same, except he would’ve been the one to find her.
    He could imagine himself there beside her. Hear himself groaning, cradling her, kneeling in the dirt with her body in his arms. His breath