This boy is not Daniel Huxton. This boy isn’t in his forties; he’s barely old enough to drive. Physically, he’s a world away from Huxton’s paunchy brawn. But there is something about him that resonates in the same way, like a musk that Emma recognizes.
It’s a scent that hovers, always, in the back recesses of her mind. She breathes through her mouth. Giving in to it, falling into a memory of Huxton now, in this room, would be the end of everything. She needs instead a symbolic memory, and when she scrabbles inside herself and finds one, she latches on to it hard.
It is a memory of her mother in the barn, wearing rain boots and holding a stainless steel carving knife. Their farm has run dairy cows for longer than Emma has been alive, and it has always been her father’s practice to select a few young steers to butcher for the family. The carcasses are hung in a concrete-floored room in the barn for about a week to cure—the room is the perfect temperature and humidity for dry aging.
Her mother checked the carcasses daily, sometimes twice daily if there was a hot spell.
“Smell that,” she said to Emma, offering up a strip of backstrap. “That there’s done. And this one here is spoiled. Can you tell the difference?”
Emma learned to tell the difference. Now her nostrils flare again as McMurtry is set across from her at the table. She’s got it now; she knows what she’s dealing with. Confident her instinct still holds, she sits down.
The same instinct gives her a basis of approach: to sympathize, wheedle, compliment. Not too many compliments—McMurtry is a talker, he’ll pick up on obvious flattery. She’ll need to be direct. And let him brag.
Bell takes the chair to her right. As the guard leaves, Emma squares the manila folder in front of her. “Clarence McMurtry—thanks for meeting with us.”
“Who the hell’re you?” McMurtry barks out. He has pimples, skinny arms, a snappable neck. His head is too big for his body, like a baby chick.
“My name is Emma Lewis and this is Travis Bell. We’re—”
“You’re not a G-man.”
Emma registers a whole lot of Down in the Holler in McMurtry’s accent, which is something she figures she can work with. She allows more Apple Creek to slide into hers. “Actually we’re both with the FBI.”
“Now that ain’t right,” McMurtry scoffs.
“Pardon?”
“You’re a girl.”
“Indeed I am.”
“And there ain’t no girls in the FBI.”
“This girl is.” She shows her teeth.
McMurtry leans back in his chair, hands on his thighs. “Well, goddamn. Now I seen everything.” He squints at Bell. “That right? There’s girls in the FBI now? And Mexicans, too, by the look of it.”
Bell’s face darkens. “Mr. McMurtry—”
Emma cuts him off. “Clarence, we’re here to talk to you about the crimes you’re in prison for, if you’re willing.”
“Well, hell yeah, I’m willing.” McMurtry squints. “What’s with yer hair? You a dyke or somethin’? Why’d you cut yer hair like that?”
Emma has been made aware that the golden rule of interrogation is never to answer the subject’s questions. Now she leans over the table as if she’s sharing a confidence. Her expression does not change one iota. “Lice.”
“Ohhh,” McMurtry says. “Yeah, I get that. Well, I’m happy to talk, but you gotta know, they don’t treat me right in here.”
“Is that so.”
“Those fuckers in Unit Care, they don’t give a spit about folks in the cells. Why, last night I said to my bunkmate Roger, I said to Roger they don’t treat us right. They ration the food, the smokes—”
“The toilet paper?”
McMurtry slaps his knee. “Hell yes! They ration that, too!”
“Lord almighty.”
“I said to Roger, I’ve about had it up to here with this ration bullshit. It makes me just wanna—ugh. You know? It makes me wanna—”
“It makes you wanna strangle someone?” Emma suggests.
McMurtry’s expression turns sly. “Oh. You got all the details about that, do you?”
She cocks her head. “Clarence, you choked three old ladies to death in their beds. Those kinds of details we tend to take note of.”
There’s a heartbeat pause, then McMurtry’s bray of laughter ricochets into the silence. He slaps his knee some more and yucks hard. Bell stares. Emma waits.
McMurtry laughs so much he has to wipe his eyes. “Oh boy. Oh yeah. You’re a funny one, ain’tcha? What’s yer name again?”
“Emma Lewis.”
“You got a smoke on you, Emma Lewis?”
For the first time, Emma’s response is delayed. It’s Bell who takes a can of Bugler out of his jacket pocket and offers it to McMurtry.
“There’s one already rolled in there,” Bell says. “You can keep the can, but I need the matchbook back.”
“I do thank you.” McMurtry’s face lights at the sight of the tobacco, his pale tongue flashing out as he licks the paper before putting the end in his mouth. The match is a puff of red. “Now, what was I goin’ on about?”
Emma sits back in her chair and smiles. “You were telling us about the murders.”
CHAPTER FIVE
The interview takes nearly an hour. By the time they return to the world outside, it’s almost three thirty and there’s a long drive ahead. Clouds are coming in from the west. Bell looks at her all the way to the car.
“What?”
“Nothing.” He grins and scuffs the gravel as he walks. “Those kinds of details we tend to take note of. Jesus.”
Emma tips her head back. The sky looks very big, and the joy of release is keen. “You should wear that suit when we go to see Gesak. It seems to impress the prison staff.”
“McMurtry even filled out the blue subject forms.”
“The parts he could write.”
“That was a good day’s work.” Bell unlocks the pickup, looking satisfied.
Emma walks around to climb in the passenger side. The air in the cab is warmer. “You want to split the driving on the way back?”
“If I get tired, yeah.” Bell exhales, sets his shoulders. “Okay, let’s get the hell out of here.”
He drives them back out the way they came in. Emma steadies herself against the bouncing of the Dodge as she examines the paperwork scrawled with McMurtry’s messy handwriting.
“How’s it looking?”
Emma flicks the pages. “Like it needs retyping.”
“That boy couldn’t spell worth a damn.”
“Bad at spelling, good at strangling women. He can put that on his résumé if he ever gets out of jail.” The adrenaline is wearing off and now her own comment sickens her. She looks away. “Sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry for,” Bell says. He waits a beat. “Do you think he feels regret? He never really expressed anything like remorse.”
“These guys never do.” Emma’s surprised at the way her words lash out, but she can’t seem to stop herself. “They just keep protesting they’ve been hard done by. If they regret anything, it’s that now they’re stuck in a ten-by-ten-foot cell. McMurtry’s no different—he doesn’t really care about the things he’s done, the women he’s killed.…”