SAFELY BURIED Chapter 29: Brains and Muscle

I flicked the switch, and a crooked line of fluorescent bulbs came on. The metal box that held the switch was attached to plastic conduit that pierced the clay from above. A few feet away, the clay gave way to limestone. I figured I was under the back wall of the house. The conduit and light bulbs stretched ahead of me in the upper-righthand corner of the rising and falling passageway.

I had to stoop or walk on all fours to make sure my head did not hit the roof of the cave or the lights. On the ground below nearly every bulb were shards of glass. The limestone cave widened and narrowed, and cool air streamed past my face. Once in a while I could walk almost standing, but sometimes I had to crawl on my hands and knees. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I was heading toward the hill behind the house, and when I saw wet spots on the walls, I guessed I was under the creek at the foot of the hill. Erosion channels meandered at my feet, and the smooth walls suggested that the tunnel flooded.

After a hundred feet or so, the passage forked, bending upward toward a vertical oval of bright light and downward into an opening just inches high, where water could escape. I stopped and listened, but there was no sound. I wondered if I had turned on the light up ahead when I flicked the switch back at the steps. I crept on like a hunchback.

At the bright oval I squeezed into a low cavern that was about fifty feet long and half as wide. Its entire length was divided by a curtain of clear plastic sheeting that looked like the Mylar the pressmen used at the Gleaner. Several bright lights hung behind the curtain. I parted two of the sheets and stepped through. It was hot behind the curtain—no cool breezes here. Ten high-intensity lamps with aluminum shades hung from the rippled ceiling. Below them on the tilted, layered floor, where limestone ripples overlapped one another, stood several dozen huge clay pots containing tall, black, wilted plants—marijuana.

Beyond the pots of dead pot were at least a dozen multisection plastic containers with new plants starting in them, maybe two hundred shoots in all. The Garths had probably been cultivating marijuana down here, and when they had been murdered, their crop died with them. But what about the little green shoots—who had planted those? It had to be Walter Boofey, I thought. Who else could it have been? Paula? Maybe, but I didn’t want to think so.

I wandered among the stricken plants. It was quite an operation. Literally underground. Far safer than growing the stuff in a field, where the police might spot it from the air. What’s more, the police would be unable to detect the heat from these lamps. We had run a feature in the paper on how they used heat sensors to locate marijuana being grown indoors. Their sensors would never penetrate a limestone cave under a hill.

I was also willing to bet that the electricity for the lamps in the cave came from the solar panels on the roof of the house and not from the Meridian County Rural Electric Membership Corporation. It was a way for Garth to hide the amount of electricity he was using. Glenn Neidig had told me that the Garths had also been thinking about erecting a windmill to generate even more power. Perhaps they had plans to expand.

The more I thought about it, the more I was impressed with the criminal mind of Wayne Garth. He could have run electrical conduit to this cave simply by taking it down the steps inside the furnace; however, that could have drawn attention to the furnace, and he didn’t want that. So he must have run a wire from the electronic components in the cellar across the ceiling to the back wall of the house, and probably outside, and then dug it down to the tunnel. Wow, all to keep anyone from finding the cave. The guy was good. A details man. He would have made a good editor.

I pushed out through the plastic and studied the rest of the cavern. Spread out on a ledge that was half the height of a table were garden tools, a large box of MiracleGro, a CD player and a pile of CDs, spare light bulbs, a pile of magazines, and a large orange bucket. Several cans of beer stood on a narrower ledge along with a box of Cheez-its and a bag of pretzels that was fastened with a clothespin. Two sleeping bags, an inflated airbed, and a pile of folded blankets lay inside the plastic sheeting, most likely because it was warmer there and sheltered from the constant draft. Paula had probably slept in one of them. Taped to the curved wall, a poster showed a marijuana plant’s stages of growth.

Also taped on the wall were several small shots of a good-looking young couple. In one, the man had his arms wrapped around the woman’s waist. She laughed as he nuzzled her neck. Other pictures showed the woman on a horse, the man smoking a joint, the woman in a field of daisies. Wayne and Cheryl Garth looked as if they had once been very happy.

I felt as if I were standing in a giant, elongated egg. Around me swirled shades of gray and white, oyster shell and pearl. A guy could get dizzy down here, claustrophobic, what with the ceiling that constantly seemed to be sinking and the walls that kept closing in. Everything was tilted or wavy or curved.

I told myself I ought to go, I had seen enough. But I had to check one more thing. The cave did not end at the far wall. At the far end of the egg there was a mouthlike opening about six feet wide and no more than ten inches high. The cool breeze issued from the arch.

“Who the hell are you?”

The words echoed off the walls as I whirled around. A sawed-off double-barrelled shotgun came marching toward me, pointed at my chest. The man carrying it was a muscular widebody in his mid to late fifties. He had a square, craggy face and ink-black hair combed straight back.

“I’m Phil Larrison from the Gleaner,” I said. “Are you Walter Boofey?”

His fleshy lips parted, and he ran his tongue around the inside of his cheek. His dark-brown eyes squinted as though he was trying to see me better. His nose had a slight twist, as if it had been broken once and never healed. He stopped six feet away. The end of the gun was two feet closer to my navel. “Yeah, that’s me. And you’re on my property—again.”

“I’m sorry I came in without permission. I knocked on the door. I didn’t think anyone was living here.”

“So you thought you could walk right in.”

“I said I’m sorry.”

“That don’t cut it.”

The shotgun looked like a cannon. His finger twitched on the trigger. I was afraid it would go off by accident. “I was talking to your mother-in-law, Esther, this morning,” I said. “She told me something that made me think there might be a cave under her old house. I came to see if I could find it.”

“Why?”

“Not many houses have caves under them. I wondered if it might help explain why Wayne and Cheryl Garth were killed.”

“Does it?”

“Those marijuana plants over there make me think it does.”

I heard women’s voices in the tunnel. One of them shouted, “Walter, are you okay? Who’re you talking to?” Her words sounded as if they came out of an echo chamber.

Boofey shouted back, “I got a little surprise for you.”

The first woman to emerge from the tunnel was a well-built redhead in tight jeans. I thought she must be Boofey’s wife, Caroline, but she looked twenty years younger than he did. The second one was Paula. Her cast was gone, and she had cut her hair. She stared at me uncertainly. “Phil?” she said. “Don’t tell me it’s you again.”

“It’s me again. Good to see you, Paula.”

“Jesus, you can’t stay out of trouble.”

“Looks that way, doesn’t it?”

“Put the gun down, Uncle Walt,” Paula said.

The gun went down a couple of inches.

The redhead said, “You’re the guy that was here last week—in the cellar.”

Up close, she looked older than I had thought. There were crow’s feet around her mouth and eyes, and her neck was showing wrinkles. I upped my age estimate to forty-five, but then it occurred to me that she was probably another ten or fifteen years older if she was the daughter of Esther Dubbs, who was in her nineties. She was in terrific shape for fifty-five or sixty.

“You must be Caroline,” I said.

“Must I?”

“I think so. I met your husband last week. I believe he accidentally tripped me while I was going down the steps.”

Boofey said, “You got that wrong. I’m just the brains of the family. She’s the muscle.”

“Yeah, I did it,” Caroline said. “I thought you were the bastard that murdered our tenants.”

Paula said, “You’re lucky you’re still alive. Caroline was ready to break your neck.”

“And she could do it if she wanted to,” Boofey said. “She used to be a wrestler and a bodybuilder. She could pick you up and break your back.” With a snap of his fingers he added, “Just like that.”

“I’m impressed,” I said. I almost asked her to strike a pose. “Thanks for not breaking my back.”

“You can thank Paula for that,” Boofey said.

“Thanks,” I said to her.

“That’s enough,” Caroline said, fed up.

I kept looking at Paula. Her eyes met mine. Silently I mouthed another thank you. She frowned and looked away.

“What do we do with him, Brains?” Caroline said. “We can’t just let him walk away this time.”

“How’s Edna Mae?” I asked Paula.

She rolled her eyes and said nothing.

Caroline said, “I’m getting tired of his squeaky voice.”

“We’ll tie him up and keep him down here,” Boofey said.

“You could dump him in the quicksand,” Caroline said.

“Quicksand?” I said. “Are you joking? Where’s there quicksand around here?”

Boofey turned to his wife. “We can’t risk it. The old geezer across the road might see us. He never sleeps.”

I stretched my arms behind me as if flexing my back and went for the gun in my belt. Though he did not appear to be looking in my direction, Boofey took two quick steps and rammed the shotgun into my chest. It made a hollow thud, and it hurt.

“You think I don’t know you got a gun, smartass?” he snarled. “Caroline, get it—behind him in his belt.”

“God, Walt, what were you waiting for?” She ran behind me, pulled up my shirt, and yanked out the .45. Then she frisked me all over and took my wallet, keys, and cell phone. I felt naked.

“Do it with his gun,” she said. “It won’t make as big a mess.”

Boofey shook his head. “Uh-uh. We need this place a few more days. I don’t want his corpse stinkin’ it up.”

“You’re not gonna shoot him!” Paula shrieked.

I began to feel scared. Really scared.

Caroline said, “He can put us all in prison, stupid.”

“Do what you said,” Paula told her uncle. “Tie him up. Keep him down here till you’re done. But you can’t shoot him. I won’t let you. He helped me. He’s my friend.”

Caroline said, “You got the hots for him, that’s all.”

“Shut your face.”

“Knock it off, both of you,” Boofey shouted. “We’re gonna tie him up. Paula, you don’t go anywhere near him. You promise me that. Got it?”

Paula didn’t answer.

“I don’t want you down here unless me or Caroline’s here too.” He put his hands on Paula’s shoulders and made her look him in the face. “I mean it, you hear me?”

“I hear you.”

Caroline said, “You can’t trust her, Walt. She’s a bitch in heat.”

Paula screamed at her: “You shut your filthy mouth. You’re the only bitch around here.” She turned to Boofey. “Don’t forget, Walt, it was me that told you about Wayne. You owe me for that.”

“Don’t listen to her, Walt,” said Lady Macbeth. “Shoot him, Get it over with.”

“You ain’t no murderer, Walter,” Paula said.

All this time Boofey’s shotgun remained focused on my belly button. I half expected Caroline to take matters into her own hands and blast me with the .45.

“What’s the rush?” Boofey said. “Let me think on it for a while.”

“Okay, you think,” Caroline snapped. She whirled away in a huff and left the cavern. The .45 was still in her hand.

Boofey said, “I guess I’m too softhearted.” He turned to me and growled, “Get down on your face. Move!”

“What’s your game, Walter?” I said. “Why do you need the cave a few more days?”

“That’s for me to know and you not to.” He jabbed me with the gun again.

“Paula, what’s going on?” I dropped to my knees and then my chest.

“The less you know, the better off you are,” Paula said.

“Smart girl,” Boofey said. “Now get me that rope over there—the thick one.”

She fetched the coiled-up rope and handed it to Boofey. He sat on my rump and twisted my arms behind my back. He took a switchblade out of his pocket and cut the rope in half. He wrapped one piece around my wrists and forearms and tied what felt like a complicated knot. When he finally got off me, he wound the other piece of rope around my ankles, bent my legs backward at the knees, and forced them down. I screamed in pain, but he just laughed and tied the end of the rope around my already bound arms.

“That oughta hold you.” He planted a big hand on my head and pressed my face into the limestone as he pushed himself up. “Don’t you go anywhere now.”

I felt like a calf at a rodeo, all trussed up while the cowboy preens.

“Come on, Paula,” he said. “We got things to do.” He started toward the tunnel. When Paula hung back, he gave her a hard stare and his voice darkened. “Let’s go, girl.”

Her thin lips and gray eyes wavered. I thought she was going to say something to me, but she turned and walked past Boofey. I watched her slip into the tunnel in front of him.

I could hardly move. I felt as if the blood had already stopped flowing in my arms and legs. I wondered if I would ever see Jodie again. Then the lights went off.