A Mammoth Murder by Bill Crider

Author:Bill Crider
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2011-12-27T05:00:00+00:00

17

THE STEAKS WERE EXCELLENT, OR AT LEAST RHODES’S WAS. HE carefully trimmed off the excess fat, but the meat was marbled with plenty more.

All the time they were eating, the noise from the private room rose in volume. It had been hardly noticeable at first because of the other noise in the restaurant, but it finally became something of a distraction. Sam Blevins went into the room several times to quiet things down, and the other diners occasionally gave it a curious glance when there was a particularly loud burst of laughter or yelling. The two waitresses who were working the tables for the Bigfoot hunters came out looking harried.

“The handsome crime-busting sheriff is going to have a word with those people shortly,” Ivy told Claudia and Jan.

“About the noise?” Jan asked.

“No. He’s going to tell them that this town isn’t big enough for them and him.”

Jan’s eyes lit up. “Is there going to be trouble?”

“No,” Rhodes said. “And it’s not quite as dramatic as Ivy makes it out to be. I’m just going to tell them that they need to leave because there’s no Bigfoot in the woods, that they’d be trespassing if they went to look for the Bigfoot that’s not there, and that they’re going to cause themselves more trouble than they need to if they don’t leave town.”

“Just like in the movies,” Claudia said. “High Noon. Or maybe Shane.”

“Or Dirty Harry,” Jan said. “‘Do you feel lucky, punk?’”

It was possibly the worst Clint Eastwood impression that Rhodes had ever heard, but then Claudia said, “Come on, punk. Make my day,” and that was even worse.

“It’s not anything like that,” Rhodes said. “Mainly because there won’t be any shooting and there won’t be any fighting.”

“Speaking of no shooting,” Jan said, “I don’t ever see you with a gun or in uniform.”

“The sheriff is the only member of the department who doesn’t have to wear the uniform when he’s on duty,” Rhodes said, “and I’m on duty twenty-four hours a day. I do carry a sidearm, though. You just can’t see it.”

“Is it under your shirt?”

“It’s in an ankle holster,” Rhodes said.

He’d just started wearing the ankle holster a week or so earlier, and he wasn’t fond of it. It did, however, keep his .38 out of sight, and it was secure. He’d read about people in other departments who’d had trouble with various sidearms and holsters, including a couple of cops in Houston, one of whom had accidentally released the safety slide of his automatic when he slid into the seat of his car. The pistol fired a bullet into his foot. Rhodes didn’t like automatics in the first place, and he also didn’t like having his weapon out for all to see, so he’d decided to give the ankle holster a try. The disadvantages were that it put the gun out of easy reach and it was uncomfortable. Rhodes told himself that he’d get used to it sooner or later.

“If you have to use the pistol, I hope you can grab it before someone shoots you,” Ivy said.

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