Unspeakable Read Free Page A

her home that hot August morning and deliver the news that no parent ever wants to hear. McCorkle managed the public-service office downtown, Ezzy knew him to speak to, but they weren't close acquaintances. McCorkle intercepted him even before he reached the front porch. He pushed open the screened door and the first words out of his mouth were, "What's she done, Sheriff?"
    Ezzy had asked if he could come in. As they made their way through the tidy, livable rooms of the house to the kitchen, where McCorkle already had coffee percolating, he told the sheriff that lately his girl had been wild as a March hare.
    "We can't do anything with her. She's half-wrecked her car by driving it too fast and reckless. She stays out till all hours every night, drinking till she gets drunk, then puking it up every morning. She's smoking cigarettes and I'm afraid to know what else. She breaks all our rules and makes no secret of it. She won't ever tell me or her mother who she's with when she's out, but I hear she's been messing around with those Herbold brothers. When I confronted her about running with delinquents like that, she told me to mind my own goddamn business. Her words. She said she could date anybody she damn well pleased, and that included married men if she took a mind to. The way she's behaving, Sheriff Hardge, it wouldn't surprise me if she has." He handed the sheriff a cup of fresh coffee. "It was only a matter of time before she broke the law, I guess. Since she didn't come home last night, I've been more or less expecting you. What's she done?" he repeated.
    "Is Mrs. McCorkle here?"
    "Upstairs. Still asleep."
    Ezzy nodded, looked down at the toes of his black uniform boots, up at the white ruffled curtain in the kitchen window, over at the red cat stretching itself against the leg of the table, onto which he set his coffee. "Your girl was found dead this morning, Mr. McCorkle." He hated this part of his job. Thank God this particular duty didn't come around too often or he might have opted for some other line of work. It was damned hard to meet a person eye-to-eye when you had just informed him that a family member wasn't coming home. But it was doubly hard when moments before he'd been talking trash about the deceased.
    All the muscles in the man's face seemed to drop as though they'd been snipped off at the bone. After that day, McCorkle had never looked the same. Townsfolk commented on the change. Ezzy could pinpoint the instant that transformation in his face had taken place.
    "Car wreck?" he wheezed.
    Ezzy wished that were the case. He shook his head sadly. "No, sir. She, uh, she was found just after dawn, out in the woods, down by the river."
    "Sheriff Hardge?"
    He turned, and there in the kitchen doorway stood Mrs. McCorkle wearing a summer-weight housecoat spattered with daisies. Her hair was in curlers and her eyes were puffy from just waking up.
    "Sheriff Hardge? Pardon me, Ezzy?"
    Ezzy looked toward the office door and blinked the deputy into focus. He'd forgotten where he was. His recollection had carried him back twenty-two years. He was in the McCorkles' kitchen, hearing not Frank, but Mrs. McCorkle speaking his name with a question mark—and a suggestion of dread—behind it. Ezzy rubbed his gritty eyes. "Uh, yeah, Frank. What is it?"
    "Hate to interrupt, but Cora's on the phone, wanting to know if you're here." He winked. "Are you?"
    "Yeah. Thanks, Frank."
    The moment he said hello, Cora lit into him. "I don't appreciate you sneaking out while I'm asleep and not telling me where you're going."
    "I left you a note."
    "You said you were going to work. And since you officially retired last night, I couldn't guess where you are presently employed."
    He smiled, thinking about how she looked right now. He could see her, all sixty-one inches of her drawn up ramrod straight, hands on hips, eyes flashing. It was a cliché, but it fit: Cora was prettier when she was angry. "I was thinking 'bout taking you out to