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CHAPTER III OF A SEVEN PART STORY

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Folks in Fort Stockton got used to seeing Howie Hermleigh around town in a brand-new Lincoln Continental. That didn’t mean they didn’t talk about it and speculate like amateur weathermen predicting a storm blowing in over the Davis Mountains. Amateur weathermen, it should be noted, are hardly ever correct—but they are rarely quiet.

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The other widows Howie had befriended over the years were jealous. Jealous that they couldn’t afford to compete for his affections with such extravagant signs of devotion. A new Lincoln made crocheted sweater vests and homemade banana puddings pale by comparison. Nilla Vanilla Wafers were no match for a six-disc CD changer and leather seats that still smelled like money.

Not that Howie wasn’t still kind. Or at least somewhat attentive. But by the one-year anniversary of T. L. Duncan’s demise—just after signing the sales agreement on Melba’s new Fleetwood—Howie’s attentions were almost entirely focused on Melba.

Rusty Hammer, being Rusty Hammer, openly speculated right there beside the Rust-Oleum display about whether the visits were conjugal.

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“She’s eighty. He’s thirty. Do the dirty deed and it’s bound to kill one of ’em,” he mentioned to anyone who came in.

Sister Thelma told him to hush, which was the equivalent of telling the sun not to come up in the east. Others wondered the same thing, though they did a better job of keeping it to themselves.

Melba noticed too.

Wanting Howie close by at all times, she purchased a small home less than a mile from her estate and gifted it to him outright. Close enough that he could be at her doorstep within minutes whenever she called. And she called often. He was there every day for lunch, arranged trips to theatrical performances at Pecos County Community College, planned day excursions, and organized longer drives to Odessa and Midland to see new museum exhibits Melba pretended to understand.

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All of this required more and more time away from the mortuary.

When Howie explained one evening that he had a funeral to attend and couldn’t be there for dinner, Melba first seemed confused, then offended, and finally angry.

“It’s high time you left that behind,” she said. “I can’t bear the thought of you tending to all those other widows. It’s tawdry. It’s time you came to work for me.”

She tossed out a salary like it was a sack of dirty laundry, a number that ended up being three times what he made at Bridges Funeral Parlor. Howie considered that it might finally be time to leave the death business and become Melba’s full-time companion.

“You make me feel young again,” she told him over candlelight one evening at the Spicy Noodle.

For his part, Howie was living his best life. He was driving the car of his dreams, had a wardrobe of expensive clothes hanging neatly in his closet, and wanted for absolutely nothing.

In a phone conversation with his sister, he told her he’d reached a level of happiness he never thought possible back when he first moved to Fort Stockton with a suitcase and borrowed grace.

For his birthday, Melba wrapped up the TAG Heuer luxury watch that had once belonged to her husband, mentioning its value—over twelve thousand dollars—so Howie would understand precisely what it represented. That came as no surprise. He had admired the watch more than once and had already looked up its value in price guides he kept on his desk.

Prairie View State Bank was formally notified that Howie’s signature was to be accepted on any of Melba’s checks.

“He’ll be looking after my affairs and paying all my bills,” Melba instructed. “No one is to question his authority.”

More than one employee at the bank quietly did just that and was told to stay in their lane.

“It’s her money,” they were reminded. “And there’s a lot of it. She can do with it whatever she wants.”

Mike Ditto, Melba’s stockbroker, did not respond as easily when she called to change the details of her accounts. He was quickly on the receiving end of her wrath, which could be flipped on like a light switch.

“You will do as instructed,” she snapped, “or my accounts will be closed by the end of the day and transferred to another broker by morning.”

Mike Ditto could not afford to lose the commissions on Melba’s trades. He altered the paperwork accordingly.

When word filtered over to the Grounds for Divorce that Melba and Howie had left for a two-week cruise through the Greek isles, the reaction around town was varied.

“Mrs. Duncan’s maid let it be known during her wash and blowout that the two were sharing a cabin,” Trixie said.

The words hung in the air like a fart in church.

Rusty wore the unmistakable look of a man who hated being right. Delgado felt his huevos rancheros come up his throat just a little just as that mental picture sunk in.. Sister Thelma crossed herself and bowed her head for a brief moment of silent reflection.

“Well,” Lucinda noted carefully, “I’ll bet that’s not what ol’ T. L. Duncan had in mind when he moved back to Fort Stockton for retirement.”

“The maid said Mr. Duncan never liked cruises,” Trixie added with a smile.

“Damn well wouldn’t like it any better now,” Rusty said.

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When the couple returned a few weeks later, Howie stopped in at Rex Hall Drug to refill Melba’s prescriptions. When Rex handed him a bag heavy with pill bottles, he shook his head.

“I don’t know what she’s paying you,” Rex said, “but you’re earning every penny of it.”

Howie smiled and said she was just an old woman who was lonely and needed a friend. He told Rex he felt honored to be there for her.

What few people in town knew—and what Rex wasn’t saying—was that Melba Duncan had already changed her will.

Howard Hermleigh was now the sole beneficiary of her entire estate.

Oil and gas leases alone generated roughly six hundred thousand dollars a year in revenue. The stock portfolio fluctuated between one and two million depending on the market. The equity in Prairie View State Bank was estimated at more than six million dollars. Best guesses around town put Melba Duncan’s net worth somewhere between twelve and fifteen million dollars.

At some point, Howie must have decided his efforts were worth more than he was being paid, generous as his salary had been. He began drafting amounts from her accounts that went beyond his compensation and far past anything Melba would have knowingly authorized.

Maybe he thought it would all be his anyway. Why not start doing some good with it now?

Jim Bowie High School received the gift of all new band instruments just before school started in the fall of ’96. The Pecos County Courthouse received an industrial power-wash that revealed a shade of limestone not seen since before the Great War. The sidewalk from the parking lot to the front entrance was jackhammered and replaced with new concrete, finished with exposed river pebbles.

“It’s more attractive,” Howie told the reporter from the Stockton Telegram-Dispatch, “and it helps elderly folks not slip when they make their way to the front door.”

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Somehow Mayor Goodman still attempted to take credit for the improvement. Angus Hopper noted it was like two rabid dogs fighting over which one got credit for killing a skunk.

Trixie and Lucinda told him to hush.

“Howie is just helping that woman do something to improve the town that she’d have never done on her own,” Lucinda said. “He’s a prince, and you guys are just jealous.”

That same year, Howie told his sister Melba had gone north to visit the one sister she was still barely speaking to for Thanksgiving. He explained to the stockbroker—who had left several messages unanswered—that Melba had taken ill and was in bed, not receiving callers.

Even Melba’s son, with whom she rarely spoke, grew concerned when his calls went unreturned for weeks and he was unable to reach his difficult mother.

Douglas Duncan eventually called Chief Martin at the Fort Stockton Police Department and asked him to perform a welfare check.

After hanging up, Chief Martin unfolded a map of the area, hoping the Duncan place lay outside city limits and therefore beyond his jurisdiction. Best he could tell, the line ran straight through Melba Duncan’s front yard.

He wasn’t eager for the fight if he wasn’t sure he could win.

Chief Martin made his way out to the department’s new 1995 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1 cruiser and somehow folded himself into the front seat for the drive. Buckling the shoulder belt was a requirement that had long ago been quietly abandoned, right after the annual physical fitness exam. The buttons on his pleated uniform shirt fought a gallant war to remain stitched as he dropped the column shifter into DRIVE and eased into traffic.

The black-and-white Caprice rode stiff on its police suspension, the LT1 5.7-liter V8 idling with a low, authoritative rumble. Dual spotlights flanked the windshield like watchful eyes. Steel wheels wore aging Goodyear Eagle RS-As, and dents on the hood bore witness to years of service. Inside, blue cloth up front gave way to vinyl in the rear, wiring looms still waiting for lights and sirens that hadn’t yet been installed. The digital speedometer glowed steadily ahead of him, flanked by analog gauges he trusted more than most people.

The Duncan grounds were meticulously kept when he pulled through the gates, Mexican laborers trimming hedges and pulling weeds as the chief parked near the front door. Dusk was rapidly approaching.

On the third ring of the bell, Howie answered with a smile that looked like he’d just been reunited with a friend from decades past.

Chief Martin was slightly taken aback but stepped into the marble-tiled entry hall.

“I’ve had a call from a worried son,” he said. “Been asked to check on his mother. Seems she hasn’t returned his calls for quite some time.”

Howie appeared concerned, but gracious.

“Well, Chief Martin,” he said, “you just make yourself at home and do whatever you need to do. Mi casa, su casa.”

Based on Howie’s chipper attitude, the pristine grounds, and the normalcy of everything he’d seen so far, the chief had already decided the drive to the edge of town had been a waste of time.

Then he noticed the freezer chest taped shut just inside the kitchen.

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