Cut to the Bone: A Body Farm Novel by Jefferson Bass

Author:Jefferson Bass [Bass, Jefferson]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery
Goodreads: 17349253
Publisher: William Morrow
Published: 2013-09-24T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 21

Brockton

“DIS-PATCH. CAN I HEP you?” From the woman’s voice—flat but twangy, like an out-of-tune banjo—I guessed that she’d lived in Wartburg, or at least somewhere in the hills of East Tennessee, all her life.

“Sheriff Cotterell, please.”

“I’m sorry, sir, Sheriff Cotterell is away right now. I can probably track him down on the radio, if it’s urgent.”

I felt a twinge of disappointment. “No, it’s not urgent. Could you give him a message, please?”

“I don’t care to,” she said, and even though I’d lived in Tennessee for three years now, it still took me a moment to translate her spoken words—which sounded like a refusal—into her actual meaning: I don’t mind.

“I’d appreciate that. This is Dr. Bill Brockton, at the University of Tennessee.”

“Yes, sir, Dr. Brockton, how are you? This is Mae. We met when you was up here awhile back, working that Donnelly woman’s murder. I hear you’re back with us on another’n now. That girl’s bones, found up on Frozen Head. I seen her pitcher on the TV news th’other night.”

“I hope a lot of other people up that way saw it, too,” I said. “That’s one of the reasons I was calling Sheriff Cotterell—to see if he’s gotten any leads since”—I caught myself just before parroting the words “her pitcher”—“since the sketch came out.”

“No, sir, I’m sorry to say we haven’t. Not a peep. But us’n the TBI’s takin’ copies all over ever’where—churches, grocery stores, gas stations, Health Department, you name it. I made a prayer request at church last Sunday, too, that the Lord’ll lay it on somebody’s heart to come forward and tell us who she is and what happened to her.”

“Well,” I said, “between the sheriff’s office, the TBI, and the Lord, sounds like y’all have all the jurisdictions covered.” I waited for a laugh, but I didn’t get one. “Other reason I was calling was to see if Sheriff Cotterell needed something from me on the Donnelly woman’s murder.”

“Denise Donnelly? What kind of follow-up? Sonofagun husband that killed her don’t come up for parole for another eight years. He ain’t filed any kind of appeal, far as I know, and I’d prob’ly know, since he’s my cousin.” A pause, then: “How come you to ask?”

“Oh, it’s nothing, really,” I said. “I got one of the Donnelly crime-scene photos in the mail the other day. No letter or anything with it—just the picture.” As I spoke, I walked to the bookcase where I’d tucked the envelope a few days before, after snatching it from Peggy’s trembling hands.

“You say the sheriff sent it to you?”

“Well, I think so,” I said. “First I thought Bubba Hardknot sent it—Agent Meffert?—but Bubba says he didn’t. So then I figured it had to’ve come from the sheriff. Figured maybe y’all were cleaning out your files.”

“I’ll ask him about it when he gets in,” she said. “But I’d be real surprised if he sent you that pitcher. He ain’t mentioned that case to me in a year or more. And he sure ain’t give me nothing like that to mail.

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