Free County Line by Bill Cameron

map.
    “You navigate.”
    Peter grunts. “I printed some Google maps.”
    “We’re saved.”
    “At your age, I’d think a paper map would be a comfort.”
    It’s been a long coupla days.
    He guides me to the interstate, and soon we’ve crossed the Ohio River and are heading north through Cincinnati, a city similar enough tox Portland that its differences make it truly alien. Billboards blare with unfamiliar local radio hosts alongside Hannity and O’Reilly. The highway is a lane too wide, the hills too soft and round. Absent are Doug firs and monkey puzzle trees, long-needled pines in their place among familiar elms, oaks and broadleaf maples. The woven highways close to the river make Portland’s modest system look like a series of wagon trails. I see more rusted-out hulks on the road in ten minutes than I see in a year back home, the result, Pete tells me, of winter road salt.
    “Must be great for everyone’s blood pressure.”
    “They don’t eat it, Skin.”
    “No, they breathe it.”
    “It’s not such a bad town. My family used to drive up from Lexington for Reds games. Riverfest too. It was fun.”
    I struggle to imagine Pete’s past life. My eyes feel like they’re full of sand. I slept on the plane. But squeezed into a seat designed for an underfed ten-year-old is no way to get any rest.
    The AC set to arctic struggles to combat the sweat on my neck. While I drive, Peter is on the phone, dialing numbers from a print-out.
    “Hello. My name is Peter, and I’m looking for an old friend from high school. Ruby Jane Whittaker … okay, sorry for bothering you.”
    According to the online directory, there are over seventy-five Whittakers in the area around Farmersville, four times what I found looking for Jimmie in the Bay Area—we didn’t limit ourselves to the initial J. I’m not expecting much, but it gives him something to do.
    “Hi, I’m looking for an old friend and wonder if you might be able to help. Her name is Ruby Jane Whit—”
    — + —
    The San Francisco cops had kept us for hours at the scene of Jimmie’s demise. There were plenty of witnesses, but Darryl ensured Pete and I got the lion’s share of the attention. My explanation for why I’d come to town and what we’d discussed with Jimmie didn’t earn us any points with the pair of sunken-eyed homicide inspectors who had the misfortune of drawing the case. Eldridge and Deffeyes: one short, thick and bearded and the other short, thick and bearded. I couldn’t tell them apart.
    “Mister Whitacre was your girlfriend’s brother?” They tag-teamed me in the street outside the bar’s entrance, the flashing lightbars and the murmurs of rubberneckers giving me a headache. Pete waited with a uniformed officer on the opposite corner. I was the lucky one; he had a clear view of Jimmie’s body.
    “ His girlfriend. Well, not anymore. I don’t know, really.”
    “You don’t know who’s girlfriend she is.”
    “Friend. We’re friends.”
    “Mister McKrall says she’s your girlfriend.”
    “Friend.”
    “And where is she now?”
    “We don’t know. That’s why we were talking to Jimmie.”
    “James Whitacre.”
    “Right.”
    “And what did he say?”
    “He didn’t know where she was either.”
    I knew the cops came off more oafish than they really were. Trying to trip me up, play the fool to see how my story changed as I tried to correct their pointed misunderstandings. But they didn’t trip me up because I didn’t try to hide anything. I shared my worry and confusion, my attempt to reach Jimmie from Portland, my decision to drive down. Obviously they thought I was nuts. After a thorough work-over, they stuck me in the back of a patrol car while they gave Pete the same treatment. The car smelled of urine, but at least it was dark and quiet. I closed my eyes and waited. Apparently Pete was no more useful, though at one point either Eldridge or Deffeyes stuck his beard in the car and told me he’d backed up my