Free Bill Crider - Dan Rhodes 09 - Death by Accident by Bill Crider Page A

direction.  Hack was staring hard at a slick-haired anchorman and didn’t appear to notice.
    Berry turned back to Rhodes.  “It sounds ridiculous when you say it that way, but it could have happened.  And then there’s Grat Bilson.”
    Grat was the vice-president of the historical society.  He was a former Clearview Catamount football player now in his middle forties but still in commendable condition.
    “What about him?” Rhodes asked.
    “Well, he could climb that tree, for one thing.”
    “Maybe,” Rhodes admitted, “but it still sounds ridiculous.”
    “How about this then,” Berry said.  “When Pep Yeldell was in high school, he stole Bilson’s car.”
    “Check on that, Hack,” Rhodes said.
    “Check on what?” Hack asked, as if he hadn’t been listening to every word.
    Rhodes told him, and Hack went to work on his computer.  It didn’t take long.
    “Joy ridin’,” Hack said.  “The car wasn’t hurt.”
    “But it gives Bilson a motive for murder,” Berry said.  “He’s the kind of man who holds a grudge.”
    Rhodes didn’t agree.  “It sounds pretty thin, and the method is still ridiculous.”
    Berry took his cap off his knee, smoothed down what was left of his hair, and fitted the cap on his head.
    “I don’t think you care about Pep Yeldell,” he said.  “Or about the Burleson cabin.”
    “I don’t know that there’s much I can do about either one of them.  Dr. White’s autopsy report indicates that Yeldell died by accident.  As for the cabin, I’m not sure that the Historical Society would be breaking any law by moving it.”
    Berry’s face turned red.  “How can you say that?”
    Rhodes didn’t answer; he asked another question.  “Who owns the cabin?”
    Berry opened his mouth, then shut it.
    “Your bunch paid for the restoration,” Rhodes said.  “But that doesn’t make you the owners.  Do you have a deed to it?”
    “Well, no, but that’s not the point.”
    “What is the point, then?”
    “The point is that they’re going to move it!”
    “Maybe they have a deed to it.”
    “They don’t.  They can’t!”
    “They might.  Have you tried to find out?”
    Berry stood up.  “Sheriff, I hope you’re not counting on my support in the next election.  I could never vote for a man who won’t uphold the law.”
    “I’m doing my best,” Rhodes said.
    “Well it’s not good enough.”
    Berry stalked away, his shoulders rigid.  He tried to slam the door, but it had an automatic closer on it.
    “Looks like you lost a vote,” Hack said, looking at the door and no longer making a pretense of watching TV.
    “It’s not the first one,” Rhodes said.
    “Won’t be the last one, either.  You really gonna let them move that cabin to town?”
    “We’ll see,” Rhodes said.
     

Chapter Thirteen
     
    R hodes was about to leave when Ruth Grady came in.
    “I’ve been talking to Bull Lowery,” she said.
    Bull was the owner of Lowery’s Paint and Body, where Pep Yeldell had worked.
    “Dr. White seems to think Yeldell’s death was an accident,” Rhodes told her, describing what he’d read in the report.  “Did Bull give you any reason to doubt any of that?”
    “It’s hard to say.  Did you know that Bull was Yeldell’s brother-in-law?”
    Rhodes shook his head.  “I didn’t even know Yeldell was married.  Hack?”
    “See what I’m tellin’ you about computers?” Hack said.  “You gotta have ’em.”
    “Never mind the little lesson in life,” Rhodes said.  “Just check on Yeldell.”
    In a few seconds Hack said, “Married to Cissy Lowery in 1993, divorced the same year.”
    “It didn’t last very long,” Rhodes said.
    “According to Bull, it lasted too long,” Ruth said.  “He says that Pep was an abuser.”
    “Hack?”
    Hack pecked at the keyboard.  “Nope.  Not a single complaint.”
    “I didn’t think I remembered one,” Rhodes said.  “She never reported him.”
    “There’s nothing unusual in that,”