Fraidy Hole: A Sheriff Lester P. Morrison Novel Read Free Page B

by his size 32 jeans. Unlike Lester, Billy Ray preferred his old Army camo footwear rather than the traditional cowboy boots favored by most residents in the county. He continued to stare out the side window as the miles passed.
    “How’s the foot?” Lester asked. “I saw you limpin ’ back there at the house.”
    “Considering what’s left of it, not that bad I guess. Some days are worse than others.”
    Lester had never heard the full story, how Billy Ray’s platoon had been ambushed by the Taliban, how men had died that day. Billy Ray wouldn’t, or couldn’t, talk about any of it and Lester didn’t push it. Some day, when the time was right, the details would come out.
    Traffic on the highway was light as usual with only a few pickups and an occasional cattle truck. Most east-west traffic in this part of the country used I-70 to the north or I-40, about a hundred and twenty miles south, leaving the narrow two-lane to the locals. Many of the homes alongside the road were similar to the S heriff’s, one story, clapboard, and built in the 60’s and 70’s. Only a few sported attached garages, most making do with pole-barns to shelter their cars and tractors. New construction in Cimarron County was mostly limited to town folks, and there was very little of that. During the past decade, one plagued with high temperatures and drought, a lot of the farmers had quit and moved out, some relocated to town to try and eke out a living doing whatever they could find. Most went east to Enid or Tulsa or Oklahoma City, leaving the land to the ranchers and their cows.
    The pickup made a slight left turn, leaving Highway 412 and onto U.S. 56 going northeast. Passing through the town of Keyes, population 350, Lester took a look at his gas gauge. Pumps of any kind were scarce in this end of Oklahoma , and it paid to be vigilant lest you find yourself on the side of some lonely road with an empty tank and no cell phone service. The needle showed a half a tank.
    “Flute Festival,” Billy Ray said.
    “Huh?”
    “The sign on the pole, it says ‘Flute Festival’. Probably the wildest thing they do here, toot on a flute.”
    “I doubt it,” Lester said, “But what’s wrong with playing a flute?”
    “Nothing, just saying.” Billy Ray pulled a scrap of paper from his shirt pocket. “According to Nelda’s directions, you need to turn south at the next intersection. Look for a roadside bar, then about a quarter mile past that.”
    “I know the bar,” Lester said. “Been there a couple of times. Once for a fight where one guy had to be hospitalized and another time when I heard the owner was serving minors. He denied it of course, but I warned him about it anyways.”

 
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 3
     
    A few minutes later, the Pirate’s Den Lounge appeared on the left. There were no vehicles of any kind in the gravel parking lot. Out front, a metal awning covered a wooden deck strewn with plastic tables and chairs. There was a well-worn divan shoved against the outside wall of the bar but only partially out of the weather. Its green vinyl covering was torn and stained. Yellow foam puffed through one end where a drunken patron had kicked it in. The Coors beer sign in the window was dark.
    Lester drove on , spotted the road he was looking for, and turned south for another half mile before entering the yard of Mr. and Mrs. Albert Parker. The house was a modest two story, at least 40 years old, maybe more, and in desperate need of upkeep. The paint—once white , but now a pale yellow—curled and peeled away from the gray and rotting boards beneath. Several sections of the cement walkway leading to the house had wide cracks with uneven jagged gaps. A John Deere tractor and assorted farm machinery —most of it rusty and surrounded by weeds —lay scattered across the property.
    A spring-loaded s creen door at the front of the house slammed shut. Imogene Parker stepped off the front porch and hurried toward the pickup. She