Grave Sight Read Free Page B

that, but like I say, it was another few hours before Dell was found. Right after that, it started raining, and it rained for hours. Wiped out the tracking scent, so the bloodhounds weren’t any use.”
    â€œWhy wasn’t anyone looking for Teenie?”
    â€œNo one knew Teenie was with Dell. Her mom didn’t realize Teenie was missing for almost twenty hours, maybe longer. She didn’t know about Dell, and she delayed calling the police.”
    â€œHow long ago was this?”
    â€œMaybe six months ago.”
    Hmm. Something fishy, here. “How come we’re just being called out now?”
    â€œBecause half the town thinks that Teenie was killed and buried by Dell, and then he committed suicide. It’s making Sybil crazy. Teenie’s mom’s hard up. Even if she thought of calling you in, she couldn’t afford you. Sybil decided to fund this, after she heard about you through Terry, who went to some mayor’s conference and talked to the head honcho of some little town in the Arklatex.” I glanced over at Tolliver. “El Dorado,” he murmured, and I nodded after a second, remembering. Paul Edwards said, “Sybil can’t stand theshame of the suspicion. She liked Teenie, no matter how wild the girl was. Sybil really assumed she’d be part of their family some day.”
    â€œNo Mister Teague?” I asked. “She’s a widow, right?”
    â€œYes, Sybil’s a fairly recent widow. She’s got a daughter, too, Mary Nell, who’s seventeen.”
    â€œSo why were Teenie and Dell out here?”
    He shrugged, with a half smile. “That’s a question no one ever asked; I mean, hell, seventeen, in the woods in spring . . . I guess we all thought it was a little obvious.”
    â€œBut they parked up by the road.” That was what was obvious, but apparently not to Paul Edwards. “Kids wanting to have sex, they’re going to hide their car better than that. Small town kids know how easy it is to be caught out.”
    Edwards looked surprised, his lean dark face shutting down on sudden and unwelcome thoughts. “Not much traffic out on this road,” he said, but without much conviction.
    I put on my dark glasses. Edwards again looked at me askance. It was an overcast day. I nodded to Tolliver.
    â€œLay on, Macduff,” Tolliver said, to Paul Edwards’s confusion. Edwards’s high school must have done Julius Caesar instead of Macbeth . Tolliver gestured to the woods, and Edwards, looking relieved to understand his mission, began to lead us downhill.
    It was steep going. Tolliver stayed by my side, as he always did; I was abstracted, and he knew I might fall. It had happened before.
    After twenty minutes of careful, slow, downhill hiking, made even trickier by the slippery leaves and pine needles blanketing the steep slope, we came to a large fallen oak piled with leaves, branches, and other detritus. It was easyto see that a heavy rainfall would sweep debris downslope, to lodge against the tree.
    â€œThis is where Dell was found,” Paul Edwards said. He pointed to the downslope side of the fallen oak. I wasn’t surprised it had taken two days to find Dell Teague’s body, even in the spring; but I was startled at the location of the corpse. I was glad I’d put on the dark glasses.
    â€œOn that side of the log?” I asked, pointing to make sure I had it right.
    â€œYes,” Edwards said.
    â€œAnd he had a gun? It was by his body?”
    â€œWell, no.”
    â€œBut the theory was that he’d shot himself?”
    â€œYeah, that’s what the sheriff’s office said.”
    â€œObvious problem there.”
    â€œThe sheriff thought maybe the gun could’ve been grabbed by a hunter who didn’t report what he found. Or maybe one of the guys who actually did find Dell lifted the gun. After all, guns are expensive and almost everyone here uses firearms of some