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.Seems like we might’ve run across him the last time we were here for a visit.Why? He giving guided tours of the courthouse now?”“Never mind.We still have some old charges against the two of you, attempted murder of a peace officer, little things like that.I’ll be back with a warrant tomorrow.”“You come right ahead, Sheriff,” Rapper said.He smiled.“We’ve talked to a lawyer about our rights and all that, and you can arrest us if you want to.But we’ll be right back out here in our little rent-house before a cat can lick its ass.You do whatever you feel like you have to do, though.”Rhodes knew that Rapper was right.He could arrest them, and maybe even hold them for a while, but they’d be out in a few hours at the most.“You’ve got a point,” he said.“Maybe I’d better just let you stay here where I can keep an eye on you.That way you might not get into so much trouble.”“You’re not thinking of depriving us of any of our rights, are you?” Rapper asked.“Not me,” Rhodes said.“I wouldn’t dream of it.” He started toward his car, then turned around.“You two enjoy your stay here in Blacklin County.”“We will,” Rapper said.“You can count on that.”Rhodes could feel Rapper’s eyes on his back all the way to the car.14RHODES WENT BACK TO THE JAIL AND WROTE OUT HIS reports.Hack was watching David Letterman on the little black and white TV set on his desk.“I don’t much like it that Letterman’s stopped giving out that Top Ten list right at eleven o’clock,” Hack said.“You never can tell when he’s gonna do it now.It might be as late as eleven-twenty or so.”Rhodes didn’t much care.He didn’t often get to watch Letterman.He took some arrest forms out of his desk drawer and got to work.“All that’d be easier to do on a computer,” Hack said.“You have the form already right there in front of you, and you don’t have to do all the pencil work.”Rhodes had so far resisted the lure of the computer, though Hack had taught him enough about one to make him comfortable with word processing.Sooner or later he’d have to learn even more, since he was contemplating buying a computer of his own, if only because the Internet would help him locate parts for the Edsel.“You could be right,” he said.“I’ll talk to the commissioners about getting one for me and the deputies.”“If you don’t solve Ty Berry’s murder, they won’t speak to you,” Hack said.“You could be right about that, too.Did Ruth find anything in his pickup?”“Not that she told me about.And Buddy didn’t find out a thing, either.His report should be on your desk with Ruth’s.”Rhodes’s desk wasn’t exactly a model of neatness.He shuffled through the papers that covered it and located the deputies’ reports.Hack was right.They hadn’t learned a thing, though Ruth wasn’t through with the pickup yet.“What about Dr.White?” Rhodes asked.“He called about a half hour before you got here.Said he’d see you in the mornin’.You know what time it is?”Rhodes looked over at Hack’s TV set, where Letterman was reading the Top Ten list for the evening.“I’d guess around eleven-twenty,” he said.“Pretty close to it.You oughta go on home.Maybe clean yourself up a little before Ivy sees you.”Ivy was getting used to having Rhodes come in late, though she didn’t seem to like it much.And she particularly didn’t like it when he came in late and beaten up.“I had a run-in with a tombstone,” Rhodes said.“See any ghosts?”“I’m not sure.I saw something.”“Did it look like a ghost?”“You mean like Casper?”“If that’s what a ghost looks like, that’s what I mean.”“It didn’t look like Caspar,” Rhodes said.“It didn’t look like much of anything.I was too far away from it, and it was moving fast.”“A ghost would move fast, I guess, not havin’ much weight to slow it down.Be all right with you if Lawton tells the inmates that the ghost is hauntin’ the cemetery now instead of the jail? Sure would quiet things down around here if they thought that ghost was gone.”“You think they’ll fall for that?” Rhodes asked.“They’re in jail, ain’t they?” Hack said.“How smart can they be?”“You might have a point there,” Rhodes admitted.“They’re no Eckstines.”“Huh?” Hack said.“Never mind,” Rhodes said.“You had to be there.Go ahead and give it a try.”“Not me,” Hack said.“That’s Lawton’s job.Or maybe you should do it.It might be they’d take it better if it came from the sheriff.”It was after lights-out, so Rhodes said, “I’ll do it in the morning.”“Good enough,” Hack said.When Rhodes arrived home, Yancey charged out of the kitchen, yapping and yipping.No burglar was ever going to get past him.Rhodes went on into the living room, where Ivy was reading a romance novel: Wild Texas Wind.Yancey trailed along behind, but he quit yapping when he saw Ivy, who held up the cover of the book so Rhodes could get a better look at it.Yancey wasn’t interested in the book at all.He turned around and went back to the kitchen.“I might be wanting to file a lawsuit against that publisher,” Rhodes said.“It looks like they’ve taken a picture of my body and put some other guy’s face on it.”“That ‘other guy’ is Terry Don Coslin,” Ivy said.“And I’ll bet you could strike a match on those pecs.You’ve heard of him, I’ll bet.”Rhodes had to admit it.Terry Don Coslin was Blacklin County’s most famous resident.After graduating from Clearview High School ten years earlier, he’d gone to college in Dallas, where someone from a modeling agency had seen him.The rest was paperback history.“His hair’s longer than I remember,” Rhodes said.“That’s what threw me off.”“Sure.And guess who the book’s by.”Rhodes looked at the cover again.“Ashley Leigh,” he said.“Guess again.”“I don’t need to guess again.It says ‘Ashley Leigh’ right there on the front of the book.”“Yes, but that’s not her real name.So guess again.”“Not Vernell Lindsey,” Rhodes said.“You got it.” Ivy smiled.“She’s finally made the big time [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]