Free 3 Coming Unraveled by Marjorie Sorrell Rockwell Page A

found out I’d been in the swamp. It was off limits.”
    “Your grandfather has been dead for years,” Cookie pointed out. “You could have come forward and put their parents’ minds at ease.”
    “By then I was afraid I’d get into trouble with the law for not telling. I had a wife, this farm to take care of. I couldn’t risk it.”
    “You’re going to have to talk to my husband,” said Bootsie. “He’s the police chief.”
    “I know who he is, Miz Purdue. I may live out here like a hermit, but Janey and I go into town once or twice a month. Right, hon?”
    The woman moved around the table refilling the coffee cups. “I told him it’d catch up with him one day,” she said flatly. “Just be my luck that he goes off to jail leaving me stuck with twins to support.”
    “ How are the babies?” inquired Maddy.
    “Th e doctor says they’re doing fine. I’m seeing a pediatrician over at Burpyville Memorial.”
    “Them two babies need a daddy. I don’t know what we’ll do if I go to jail,” said Errol. He was a guy used to having bad luck.
    “You needn’t worry about that,” offered Bootsie. “The statute of limitations has passed a long time ago.”
    “Then I’m willing to confess all. Especially since them boys have started turning up again. If I don’t tell, they will.”
     
     

 
    Chapter Twenty-One
     
    A week later, both Harry Periwinkle and Jud Watson were sitting in jail cells in Indianapolis, awaiting arraignment. They both refused to talk, not willing to further incriminate themselves in the identity scam.
    Maud Purdue and her oldest son N.L. were meeting with the police chief to get an update.
    “ I demand that justice be done!” exclaimed N.L. “Those men deserve punishment, trying to bilk me out of half the chair factory. Not to mention trying to take my mother’s life savings.”
    It was amazing, Jim Purdue thought, how that money hidden in the old quilt had morphed into a savings plan. Maud hadn’t even known it was there till the Quilters Club got involved.
    “They’ll get some stiff prison time,” predicted Chief Jim Purdue. “No question about it.”
    “ Forget about them,” snapped Maud Purdue. “What about my son Bobby Ray? According to Errol Baumgartner, he’s alive.”
    “Those boys know where he is,” the police chief nodded. “Just be patient. Eventually they’ll talk to cut a deal.”
    “ I’ve waited thirty years,” she sighed. “Guess I can wait a little bit longer.”
    “How can you be so sure they know where my brother is?” asked N.L. Purdue. He was a skinny man with bushy eyebrows and thinning hair. His black suit made him look more like an undertaker than a furniture maker.
    “ Because they had to get a DNA sample from Bobby Ray to substitute for Harry’s.”
    “Are you saying he was in on the swindle?” frowned N.L.
    “ I doubt it. He could’ve stepped forward to claim ownership in E Z Seat, or retrieve his great-grandmother’s quilt, without resorting to a scam that involved switching identities.”
    “My brother was declared legally dead more than twenty years ago. Don’t see why I’ve gotta share ownership in the chair factory with a dead man – even if he comes back to claim it.”
    “That’s a question for lawyers,” said Jim Purdue.
    ≈≈≈
    Tilly allowed her brother to come over that night to watch a Netflix movie with Agnes. She was still grounded.
    With the Haney Bros. Circus lingering on Aggie’s mind, she elected to watch a rerun of “The Greatest Show on Earth,” a story built around the Ringling Brothers Circus.
    The big train wreck scene was exciting enough to make Aggie squeal when the engine went off its tracks and wild animals broke from their cages.
    She thought Charlton Heston with his leather jacket and fedora looked like Indiana Jones. “Where’s his bullwhip?” she asked.
    Freddie explained that the reason Jimmy Stewart never removed his clown makeup was because he was hiding from the law.