Sacrificial Ground by Thomas H. Cook

toward Caleb. “He was skinny as a rail back then. Wasn’t you, Caleb?”
    I was, yes.
    â€œHandsome, too,” Beatrice said. She shook her head despairingly. “But so thin. Lord, you could just about see through him.” She leaned forward and patted his belly. “Look like somebody done knocked you up, Cal.” She glanced back at Frank, and he saw the wildness in her eyes. “But he could go all night back in them days.” She turned back toward Caleb and smiled affectionately. “Could ’bout wear a girl out, couldn’t you?”
    â€œWith the right help, I could,” Caleb said, and the two of them laughed softly.
    â€œI understand you’ve been staying at a house near Glenwood?” Frank said.
    â€œThat’s right,” Beatrice told him. “I been takin’ care of my sister’s kids. She on her honeymoon. I never figured she’d get married again, but she done it, so I come down to see after the kids.”
    â€œCaleb says they keep you up at night?”
    â€œThat’s right, too,” Beatrice said. “They don’t got much sense, them two. They run all over me. Like wild animals.” She pointed toward a small dirt hill. Two children were tumbling down it, spewing waves of dry dust into the air. “See ’em. Like monkeys.” She shook her head. “Shit, if I’d acted like them two, my mama would have nailed my bare feet to the kitchen floor.”
    Frank took out his notebook. “So you were up early on Tuesday morning?”
    Beatrice nodded, her eyes looking closely at his face. “You had a talk with the wrong guy, looks like.”
    â€œMore than one,” Caleb said.
    Beatrice smiled. “’Member when them two got after you that time? You was all busted up.”
    â€œTuesday morning you were up, is that right?” Frank repeated.
    â€œTill the break of dawn.”
    â€œWhat did you see?”
    â€œWell, they ain’t much traffic on them sidestreets that time of the morning. So, I heard a car, and I looked out the window, sort of hoping it was my sister. It was a crazy thought, like maybe she done got tired of that fat bastard and left him on the beach. It was a crazy thought, but you know, when you want something bad, it does things to your mind.”
    â€œWhat kind of car was it?”
    â€œFancy car,” Beatrice said, “like you don’t see much around here.”
    â€œDo you know what kind it was?”
    â€œIt was a red little thing. What they call a ‘coupe,’ I think. It looked like a foreign car.”
    â€œDid you happen to notice what model it was?”
    â€œI don’t know models much. Used to, I did. Back when they was just a Buick and a Ford. They got too many of them foreign cars now.”
    â€œWas it new?”
    â€œOh yeah, it was new. Real shiny. Red as a rose. Only brighter. Bright red.”
    Frank wrote it down. “Which way was the car coming?”
    â€œUp from Glenwood,” Beatrice said, “going sort of slow.”
    â€œSo you were facing the headlights?”
    â€œYes,” Beatrice said, “shined right in my eyes. But then he flashed them off, and it was black night again.” She looked at Caleb. “Black as my old ass, right, Caleb?”
    Caleb took out his pipe. “Double or single headlights, Bea?”
    â€œTwo of them,” Beatrice said. She looked scoldingly at the pipe. “So you still smoking that thing?”
    â€œJust like always.”
    â€œHow’s your poor wife stand it?”
    â€œJust like always,” Caleb said, and again they laughed together.
    â€œWhere did the car stop?” Frank asked.
    â€œâ€™Bout halfway up the street,” Beatrice said. “It circled a time or two. Then it pulled up to the curb right by that empty lot. Then the lights went off.”
    â€œCould you see the car clearly?”
    â€œIt was pitch black, except for that