Free 7 - Rogue: Ike Schwartz Mystery 7 by Frederick Ramsay Page A

to have fallen slightly out of favor.
    Ike waved the refusal off and said that since he had leave time accumulated, he would use it. The mayor said he wouldn’t approve any leave. Ike said he would take it anyway. The mayor said he’d fire Ike. Ike reminded him he had been elected, not hired, and therefore, couldn’t be fired but only recalled. Since there was an election in less than a month, that did not seem to be a worthwhile undertaking. The mayor was not happy. He picked up the phone and, giving Ike a significant look, called the town’s attorney. Ike left.
    Essie Sutherlin saw Ike first and let out a whoop. Ike smiled an acknowledgement and headed to his office.
    “Yo, Essie, how’s Junior?”
    “Growing like a weeping willow on a river bank. How’s Miz H?”
    “Holding steady, thank you. Oh, and thanks to everybody for the flowers.”
    “Ike, the word around here is you don’t think Miz Harris’ accident was one. Is that true?”
    “Yes, I don’t consider it an accident. But it’s not simply a matter of what I think. There is clear evidence that says her car did not skid because of wet streets. Somebody rammed her and made sure she crashed into that pole.”
    “Who?”
    “No telling. I’m working on it. There’s no dearth of suspects.”
    “No dearth? That means a whole lot, right? I bet I know who did it.”
    “Really? Who?”
    “Jack Burns, that’s who, your opponent in the sheriff’s race. He has a good reason to, doesn’t he?”
    “A reason to make Ruth crash? How do you figure that?”
    “Not Miz H, Ike, you.”
    “Me?” Essie, it seemed, shared Charlie’s concern that the perpetrator of this mess wanted to get at him through Ruth.
    “Well of course. It was your car that got sideswiped, wasn’t it?”
    “Yes, but I wasn’t driving it.”
    “He wouldn’t know that. He knows it’s your car and here’s a chance to eliminate you from the race. Look, Ike, you got this election all sewed up, everybody knows that, so what else is that carpetbagger going to do.”
    “First, Essie, he’s not a carpetbagger and—”
    “He is. He only moved over here from Buena Vista at the invitation of the mayor and just in time to qualify as a resident to get on the ballot. Then he’s walking around town talking trash about how big a cop he was over there, and how professional and all, and he ain’t.”
    “Okay, if you insist. But it’s a pretty radical idea, you have to admit. What is the likelihood he drove all the way to Washington in a big truck in the hopes of catching me on a wet street in the dark?”
    “You don’t have to make this complicated, Ike. Maybe it was one of them serendipity things. Say he’s up there visiting his old granny or something, and sees your car. ‘Ha,’ he says, ‘I’ll notch this dude right here and now.’ Then—”
    “’Notch this dude?’ What does that mean?”
    “It’s something Billy always says. I think it means to put you down or something. See, he does have motive and opportunity.”
    “Essie, you’ve been hanging around cops too long. First, you haven’t come close to establishing opportunity. Was Jack Burns in Washington Sunday night? Does he drive a truck or even own one? Did he drive it to DC to visit, as you suggest, his old granny? And why in a big truck?”
    “I’ll bet he does own one. Everybody in Buena Vista’s got them a pickup at least. What kind of truck are we talking about?”
    “It’s a five-year-old Silverado platform with a modified front bumper, definitely not a pickup truck,” Frank Sutherlin said. He’d come in the middle of Essie’s Agatha Christie moment.
    Ike had not seen him enter and turned. “You have some news for me from the State forensics lab?”
    “Preliminary stuff, Ike, but useful for starters. The truck is what I just said. The front bumper had some sort of projections on it and it was not, as far as the techs could tell, either standard or optional manufacturer’s equipment.”
    “A custom