Kathy Hogan Trocheck - Truman Kicklighter 01 - Lickety-Split by Kathy Hogan Trocheck Page B

nurse?”
    “We’ll be fine,” Pearl said fiercely. “Just fine.”
     
    The dining room was almost empty by the time Truman sat down for lunch. It was nearly one now. The meat loaf special would be gone and so would the good desserts.
    He’d picked up a discarded newspaper in the lobby on the way in. Now he unfolded it and began looking for the story of Mel’s arrest.
    He found it on the front of the local section. A twelve- inch story. More than was allotted to a domestic knifing in one of the city’s public housing units, much less than the thirty-two inches allotted to a story about the arrest of Norman Giddens, the veteran weatherman on Channel 9, who’d been picked up for soliciting an underage prostitute in a strip joint over in Tampa.
    Truman allowed himself a small chuckle over the police mug shot of Giddens, who had apparently tried to cruise incognito, disguising himself with a cheap toupee and ridiculous-looking glued-on sideburns and mustache.
    Jackleen appeared from nowhere, sliding a steaming plate of meat loaf, mashed potatoes, and LeSueur peas in front of him.
    “Here,” she said. “I saved you a plate.”
    “Thanks,” Truman said, meaning it. “I was afraid I’d have to settle for the salmon patties.”
    “You mean the sawdust patties? I wouldn’t feed them to my worst enemy,” Jackleen said. “How’d it go in court this morning?”
    He handed Jackleen the newspaper. She set the coffeepot down so that she could read it.
    “Says here the police confirm that someone was questioned for the murder, but there hasn’t been an arrest,” Jackleen said. “Sure looks like an arrest to me when they put handcuffs on somebody and put him in the back of the police car.”
    Truman finished chewing and took a sip of coffee. “These reporters today, they got computers, faxes, everything. The only thing they don’t have is an instinct for news.”
    “What’s your instinct telling you now?” Jackleen asked, glancing around to make sure Mrs. Hoffmayer wasn’t watching.
    “Mel didn’t do it,” Truman said. “Period.”
    “Okay,” Jackleen said. “I believe you. But if Mr. Mel didn’t do it, who did?”
    He put the cup down. He’d dreamed about the girl last night. Rosie. So young. He could see the long dark hair in his dream, dark and damp with her own blood. But in the dream Rosie had had Cheryl’s face.
    “She hung out at racetracks every night,” he said.
    “Gamblers are a rough bunch. And she was young. Maybe she was mixed up with dope or something.”
    There was a small photograph of Rosie in the newspaper. It looked like the kind of picture they put on an ID.
    “She had a nice face, huh?” Jackleen said. “Twenty years old. I wonder how she knew so much, to be able to pick winners like that. Mr. Mel, he said she was real smart about greyhounds.”
    “She was smart,” Truman said thoughtfully. “Too smart, maybe.”
    He drank his coffee and brooded about it. “Maybe she got in with the wrong type of man,” he said. “Girl that pretty is sure to have a boyfriend.”
    Jackleen nodded sagely. “Uh-huh. Now you talkin’. Probably some sorry-ass dude put her out there sellin’ them sheets. Like a pimp.”
    “Doesn’t sound like you have a very high opinion of men,” Truman said, wiping a bit of gravy from his mustache.
    “See, men my age, they’re not like you, Mr. K,” Jackleen said. “Don’t want no commitment, don’t wanna settle down, work a job, make a home. All they wanna do is be runnin’ in the street.”
    “Surely not all of them,” Truman said.
    “All the ones I been mixed up with,” Jackleen said. “Sorry, that’s what they are. Now, take somebody like you. How long were you married?”
    “Forty-five years,” Truman said softly. “My sweetheart and I were married in 1949. Six weeks after we met.”
    “You’re kidding,” Jackie said. “You only knew her six weeks and y’all got married?”
    “No point in waiting around,” Truman said