"Powder Monkey of Cape Fear" won second place in the Lower Cape Fear Historical Society Annual Short Story Contest in 2005. You can find this story and others in the collection, "Encounter in a Small Cafe" by Jon Batson.
Episode 3
“Slip away? Did he take the treasure?”
“No time. Bonnet was making preparations to leave for Bath with some of his crew, Blackbeard was trying to look nonchalant while making preparations to sail off, cheating Bonnet out of a great deal of plunder. It was a window of opportunity for a random small-fry to get misplaced. Bonnet would think he was with Blackbeard and visa-versa.”
“Where’d he go?”
“He slipped overboard, between the devil and the deep blue sea, so to speak, and onto the mainland. The area got rather hot for pirates after that and he did what many sailors did.”
“What was that?”
“He picked up an oar and began to walk inland, determined to keep the water to his back and to walk until someone asked, ‘What’s that you got there?’ – then he would choose that place to live. In his case it wasn’t too far before he met his Sarah, settled down, and started a family. He never went back for the treasure.”
My jaw went slack and my eyes were like pie-pans. I could see Grampa was amused by my surprise.
“Who got the treasure?” I demanded.
“Stede Bonnet sailed to the Virgin Islands having changed his name to Edwards and renaming his sloop the Royal James. He returned to Cape Fear in September of 1718 where he met his end. His crew was hanged in November 1718 and Captain Bonnet followed on December 10.”
“All but Thomas Donny…”
“Yes, all but Powder Monkey Thomas Donny. He changed his name to Donnally, married Sarah Ann Baker; and raised a family in the Smokey Mountains.”
“So what became of the treasure?” I screeched.
“The map’s still among his personals,” Grampa said calmly, pulling out another pipe from the circular holder on the side table.
Blood rushed to my face, then drained from my head; leaving me dizzy. I steadied myself on the counter. The possibilities overwhelmed me.
“Where?”
“In the bedroom…” He pointed with his pipe into the darkened room.
I turned, moving too quickly for the small house, reaching the bedroom sooner than I anticipated. My foot hit something hard and I fell forward onto the hardwood floor.
“…soon as you go in. Young people today, always in a rush.” Grampa got up, walked to the fridge. “You want a beer now?”
I rolled over, trying to see where I’d tripped up, as it were. It was a suitcase, not what I expected at all, a brown leather suitcase with metal snaps. It was worn and old, but not three hundred years old.
“This doesn’t look like a pirate chest.”
“What do you think a pirate chest looks like? Ever seen one?”
I sat up and turned the suitcase around. ‘TAD’ it said on the engraved plate.
“T.A.D. – what’s that?”
“Theodore Andrew Donnallson, my father. That’s what he handed it to me in. The parcel has changed hands a few times. During the Revolution, Able Christian Donnelly put it in a courier sack and buried it under the church. In the Great War, the churchyard was expanded to bury returning soldiers, so Thomas Wilfred Donnellton moved the courier sack into a tobacco box and put it in the attic. The family name changed through a mistake in voter registration during Prohibition and he just let it go like that. My father put it in that suitcase and now I give it to you.”
My palms were sweating and I was short of breath. I looked up imploring.
“What do I do?”
“If I were you, I’d put it in a nylon knapsack and give it to your son.”
I stared at the suitcase, not daring to imagine its contents. Could this be a map of Treasure Island, with pirates and swag and doubloons and all?
“Shouldn’t we go get it?” I sat on the floor barely touching the suitcase, not yet daring to reach for the metal snaps.
“Thomas didn’t. Nor did his son, or his, nor any of the Donnys, Donnellys, Donnelltons, or Donnallsons since. I’ve gotten along just fine without it. Why spoil a good thing?”
I couldn’t believe my ears! Here was a possible fortune within his grasp and this old man did nothing. I looked at him in wonder, motionless.
“You’re gonna hatch that thing if you sit on it like that!”
“I just, I never, I mean, I don’t know... I never had a treasure map before.”
“Might not be a map, might be directions in old 1700’s English, all with extra “e’s” on the end and so on. Might be just a diary, I don’t know. I never really opened it up.”
“What! Never opened it! How could you know this story and never open it up? I’ve known about it for less than an hour and it’s burning a hole through me!”
“I guess I just never considered it important enough to go and see,” said Grampa calmly. “Your father never cared for family legends, so I thought I’d let you be the keeper of the family secret. But if you’re not up to it…” he leaned forward.
“No! I mean, I’m fine. I’ll keep it. I’m OK. It’s good.” I tried to sound convincing but I had a death grip on the suitcase.
“Have it your way.” Grampa lit up the pipe. “But I’ve found that the best security is the knowledge that no matter what happens, you can handle it. The only one you can really count on is you. You can trust in your family and hope your friends will be there, but you can only speak for yourself.
“Maybe there’s treasure, maybe not. Maybe someone’s already turned the ground and some modern-day Ben Gunn has spent it. Or it might be sittin’ there waiting for the next Thomas Wilfred in line.”
I sat transfixed as the possibilities were handed to me one at a time.
“If it’s a thousand dollars, you’ll spend it in a couple of months and the family treasure will be a memory. If it’s a hundred thousand it’ll get noticed and there’ll be a line of people insisting it’s really theirs and another line wanting their slice. Or have you forgotten the IRS?”
The furrowed eyebrows danced up and down, as if delivering a message of their own.
“or…” he puffed the pipe and the swirl of white smoke enveloped his head. “you could put it in a vault of its own, in the ground, in the attic, in a safety-deposit box, and one of these fine days you can hand it off to your son, or if he doesn’t want it…” Grampa cast a glance at the stern picture of my father on the wall beside him, “than to your grandson.”
My jaw closed and I gulped hard.
“Imagine, handing that to your grandson and saying, ‘You know what’s in here, boy? Pirate treasure!’ Can you imagine the look on his face?”
“That would be something!” I had to admit.
“Yup! That’s be worth… well, it’d be worth a chest full of gold.”
“Yes, it would.” I agreed.
I put the suitcase aside. There would be time to move the contents to another container and place it in a safe place. Grampa looked at me with contented eyes and a warm smile. He had chosen well, he’d passed on the family legacy and the Donnalson secret had a new protector.
“Now,” said Grampa, “how about that beer?”
The End
Stay tuned for other stories from this collection
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Powder Monkey of Cape Fear
Episode 2
Grampa lit up his pipe and I watched a swirl of white smoke circle his head like a Christmas wreath.
“There’s beer in the ice box. You want one?”
“Uh, no, Grampa.”
“I do. Get me one. There’s a good fellow.”
Outside a cricket started up, kicking a cricket symphony into high gear. A dog passed by the road at the far end, stopped, sniffed, and continued on. I opened a beer, poured it into a tall glass from the freezer, and handed it to Grampa. He took a drink and set the glass on the side table. I sat back down, leaning forward, waiting for the punchline or the explanation, whichever was to come next.
“Giovanni da Verrazzano visited the south tip of the North Carolina coast in 1524 and called the place Promontorium Tremendum.”
I looked at him, dipping my head slightly. He glanced at me.
“Cape Fear,” he said as if I should have known. “And it’s been that ever since. Dangerous place! Fierce weather, treacherous shoals and currents, all add up to bad news for sailors.”
Grampa sat back, puffed the pipe, then leaned forward again.
“Your great-great-great-great… grandfather Thomas Wilfred Donny was a sailor. He sailed from Bristol with the British Navy as a young man assigned the lowest and most dangerous task on board a ship – Powder Monkey – Gunner’s Assistant. The young assistants were treated badly, rarely paid, and had little chance of advancement – in fact, it was most likely they’d be the first killed in any sort of fight.”
“Why’d he take the job? I would have turned it down.” I had him there.
“Couldn’t,” was Grampa’s reply. “It was go to sea or starve in Bristol, and once aboard, you did what you were told. He was a Powder Monkey or he would be hanged – that was all there was to it. Life at sea was hard.”
Grampa sat back, reflecting on how hard the British Navy must have been. Outside, I saw the afternoon light begin to fade. It had taken me most of the day to drive. I looked around for a light. As I did, Grampa twisted in his chair, picked up a dimmer switch from the floor beside him and a light in the corner behind him came alive. He sucked a full breath and continued.
“That was before the light at Bald Head Island. It was tricky working a sailing vessel through those waters, but that is one of the things that made it a haven for pirates. Topsail Island got its name from the pirate ships that moored there; you couldn’t see anything but their topsails.
“It was in 1717 that young Thomas Donny became reassigned at random to the crew of a coastal merchant ship. He leaped at he chance, though he didn’t dare show it. Though it was a smaller vessel under dubious leadership, anything would be better then the life of a Powder Monkey.
“The merchantman was soon captured by one of the most famous pirates there was, one Stede Bonnet, the ‘Gentleman Pirate.’ The crew was taken hostage and informed that they could sail...” Grampa raised his head with the words, “...or swing.” He dropped his head and looked at me through bushy furrowed eyebrows.
“Bald Head Island was their favorite stopping point to get food. Blackbeard himself used the place quite a lot. In fact, it was there that Captain Bonnet met Captain Teach and fate took a turn for your great-great-great… er, grandfather.”
Grampa sat back again, puffed his pipe, turned it over, and tapped it on his palm over a metal trashcan at his feet. The ashes dumped out and he set the pipe on a circular pipe stand on the shelf to his right.
“Grampa, go on – you can’t stop there!” I broke in.
“How ‘bout some food? You hungry?”
“No! Please, go on.”
“Just trying to be sociable is all. Bald Head Island wasn’t just used for a watering hole. No, it was sometimes used as a bank vault. A lot of times a pirate’s loot was more supply than gold: food and water, powder and shot, or tools and lumber. But sometimes there were treasure chests and when they got worrisome, the pirates would put them someplace safe.
“It was just after Bonnet and Blackbeard joined up that Blackbeard set one of his officers to run Bonnet’s ship. Bonnet agreed, though he had little choice in the matter; he wasn’t much of a seaman. Young Thomas Donny was off the ship getting water when a short-crew passed him up with a chest. He had learned that the way to survive, be it British Navy, merchantman or pirate vessel, is to keep your head down. He was busy keepin’ his head down when the short-crew came back the other way only without the chest.
“Once they were gone, he followed the footprints to a place where the ground was just turned. A whistle sounded 'return to ship', so he noted the spot. That night, according to his letters, a squall came up and it rained to beat all, removing any track or trace of the previous day’s adventures.
“It was pretty soon after the siege of Charles Town of that year when they returned to these waters. Blackbeard convinced Bonnet that it would be best if they were to get pardons and Bonnet set out with some of the pirates to see Governor Eden at Bath Town. It was then that Thomas Donny saw a chance to slip away.”
Grampa lit up his pipe and I watched a swirl of white smoke circle his head like a Christmas wreath.
“There’s beer in the ice box. You want one?”
“Uh, no, Grampa.”
“I do. Get me one. There’s a good fellow.”
Outside a cricket started up, kicking a cricket symphony into high gear. A dog passed by the road at the far end, stopped, sniffed, and continued on. I opened a beer, poured it into a tall glass from the freezer, and handed it to Grampa. He took a drink and set the glass on the side table. I sat back down, leaning forward, waiting for the punchline or the explanation, whichever was to come next.
“Giovanni da Verrazzano visited the south tip of the North Carolina coast in 1524 and called the place Promontorium Tremendum.”
I looked at him, dipping my head slightly. He glanced at me.
“Cape Fear,” he said as if I should have known. “And it’s been that ever since. Dangerous place! Fierce weather, treacherous shoals and currents, all add up to bad news for sailors.”
Grampa sat back, puffed the pipe, then leaned forward again.
“Your great-great-great-great… grandfather Thomas Wilfred Donny was a sailor. He sailed from Bristol with the British Navy as a young man assigned the lowest and most dangerous task on board a ship – Powder Monkey – Gunner’s Assistant. The young assistants were treated badly, rarely paid, and had little chance of advancement – in fact, it was most likely they’d be the first killed in any sort of fight.”
“Why’d he take the job? I would have turned it down.” I had him there.
“Couldn’t,” was Grampa’s reply. “It was go to sea or starve in Bristol, and once aboard, you did what you were told. He was a Powder Monkey or he would be hanged – that was all there was to it. Life at sea was hard.”
Grampa sat back, reflecting on how hard the British Navy must have been. Outside, I saw the afternoon light begin to fade. It had taken me most of the day to drive. I looked around for a light. As I did, Grampa twisted in his chair, picked up a dimmer switch from the floor beside him and a light in the corner behind him came alive. He sucked a full breath and continued.
“That was before the light at Bald Head Island. It was tricky working a sailing vessel through those waters, but that is one of the things that made it a haven for pirates. Topsail Island got its name from the pirate ships that moored there; you couldn’t see anything but their topsails.
“It was in 1717 that young Thomas Donny became reassigned at random to the crew of a coastal merchant ship. He leaped at he chance, though he didn’t dare show it. Though it was a smaller vessel under dubious leadership, anything would be better then the life of a Powder Monkey.
“The merchantman was soon captured by one of the most famous pirates there was, one Stede Bonnet, the ‘Gentleman Pirate.’ The crew was taken hostage and informed that they could sail...” Grampa raised his head with the words, “...or swing.” He dropped his head and looked at me through bushy furrowed eyebrows.
“Bald Head Island was their favorite stopping point to get food. Blackbeard himself used the place quite a lot. In fact, it was there that Captain Bonnet met Captain Teach and fate took a turn for your great-great-great… er, grandfather.”
Grampa sat back again, puffed his pipe, turned it over, and tapped it on his palm over a metal trashcan at his feet. The ashes dumped out and he set the pipe on a circular pipe stand on the shelf to his right.
“Grampa, go on – you can’t stop there!” I broke in.
“How ‘bout some food? You hungry?”
“No! Please, go on.”
“Just trying to be sociable is all. Bald Head Island wasn’t just used for a watering hole. No, it was sometimes used as a bank vault. A lot of times a pirate’s loot was more supply than gold: food and water, powder and shot, or tools and lumber. But sometimes there were treasure chests and when they got worrisome, the pirates would put them someplace safe.
“It was just after Bonnet and Blackbeard joined up that Blackbeard set one of his officers to run Bonnet’s ship. Bonnet agreed, though he had little choice in the matter; he wasn’t much of a seaman. Young Thomas Donny was off the ship getting water when a short-crew passed him up with a chest. He had learned that the way to survive, be it British Navy, merchantman or pirate vessel, is to keep your head down. He was busy keepin’ his head down when the short-crew came back the other way only without the chest.
“Once they were gone, he followed the footprints to a place where the ground was just turned. A whistle sounded 'return to ship', so he noted the spot. That night, according to his letters, a squall came up and it rained to beat all, removing any track or trace of the previous day’s adventures.
“It was pretty soon after the siege of Charles Town of that year when they returned to these waters. Blackbeard convinced Bonnet that it would be best if they were to get pardons and Bonnet set out with some of the pirates to see Governor Eden at Bath Town. It was then that Thomas Donny saw a chance to slip away.”
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Powder Monkey of Cape Fear
Episode 1
I suppose you could say I stumbled over my inheritance. After all, I stumbled over everything else in life. I stumbled over my college grant and wound up majoring in horticulture instead of theater. I stumbled over my job making television commercials when a favor to a friend turned into a career. Planning was obviously wasted on me.
Let’s go back. It was not too long ago that I received a call from my grandfather Thomas, age 89, saying that he would like to see me before he “moved along in the great scheme of things”.
Grandfather Thomas Wilfred Donnalson was the colorful old man of the family who was always fond of saying things like that, or “It’s Earth, y’know – no one’s gettin’ out alive.”
I was named for my eloquent grandfather, as he was named for his grandfather and he was named for his. The last name, however, seemed to change with every voter registration. Grandfather Thomas’s grandfather was Thomas Wilfred Donnallton and his grandfather was Thomas Wilfred Donnally, and before him the enigma of the family, Thomas Wilfred Donny, 1698-1763.
The finer points of a cloudy family history, missing certain parts and shrouded in mystery, had been pretty boring to me even as a child. Now at twenty-six I had other things on my mind; but being a dutiful grandson, I made some time and headed down to Grampa Tom’s place in Wilmington.
As I pulled my Jeep off Oleander, the familiar off-white sand and long-needle pine trees reminded me of earlier days visiting Grampa. The house had since become his ‘Hermitage’ and was sorely in need of repair.
“You gotta be kiddin’ me!” I said aloud, noticing the overgrown yard and neglected porch. Grampa’s boat sat in the yard, not looking very seaworthy.
“Don’t sell ‘er short,” said a scratchy voice from within. “She’s withstood everything Ol’ Lady Nature could throw. Come in, Tom.”
“Grampa Tom?” I said, pulling open the storm door.
“Come in and sit down. There’s a few things to go over and I feel something powerful pulling at me.”
“How are you doing?” I tried to sound like I could do something about it if the answer was bad.
“Oh! Me? I’m doing great! I just can’t stay long. Got places to go and I’m packin’ light. No one takes a knapsack into heaven.”
I smiled – I was in the right place. Gramps was his old enigmatic self.
“What’s up, Grampa?”
“Sit down. There’s history to impart.”
I pulled up a straight-backed chair, the only one in sight, and sat down to await the ramblings of the colorful old dodger with a patient smile.
“Don’t gimme that smile; that’s your father’s smile, I’d know it anywhere. It’s that ‘Go on, rattle away’ smile I always get from him. Listen up, this is important.”
“OK, OK, sorry,” I said, pulling my chair a half-inch closer and trying not to do my father’s cynical smile.
“Why do you think you’re a Donnalson?” He flashed an elfish twinkle.
“Never thought about it.” It was true. I hadn’t.
“Why not a Donnallton or a Donnally or” he paused to be sure he had my attention, then said with great import, “a Donny.”
The old man sat back, smiling, waiting for the light bulb to go off in my head. When it didn’t, the luster faded from his face.
“Alright, boy, I can see I’m in for it. It was easy for me to change it to Donnalson. It was wartime, records were slippery – Giuseppe Verde became Joe Green due to anti-Italian sentiment, Viktor Schmidt became Vic Smith, and so on. Lots of people changed their names, but I changed it because Donnallton was getting a bit familiar in these parts.”
“Why?”
“For the same reason that my grandfather changed it from Donnally and his grandfather changed it from Donny – Blackbeard’s treasure.”
My eyebrows went up.
“I see I have your attention.” He sat back with a satisfied smile.
I suppose you could say I stumbled over my inheritance. After all, I stumbled over everything else in life. I stumbled over my college grant and wound up majoring in horticulture instead of theater. I stumbled over my job making television commercials when a favor to a friend turned into a career. Planning was obviously wasted on me.
Let’s go back. It was not too long ago that I received a call from my grandfather Thomas, age 89, saying that he would like to see me before he “moved along in the great scheme of things”.
Grandfather Thomas Wilfred Donnalson was the colorful old man of the family who was always fond of saying things like that, or “It’s Earth, y’know – no one’s gettin’ out alive.”
I was named for my eloquent grandfather, as he was named for his grandfather and he was named for his. The last name, however, seemed to change with every voter registration. Grandfather Thomas’s grandfather was Thomas Wilfred Donnallton and his grandfather was Thomas Wilfred Donnally, and before him the enigma of the family, Thomas Wilfred Donny, 1698-1763.
The finer points of a cloudy family history, missing certain parts and shrouded in mystery, had been pretty boring to me even as a child. Now at twenty-six I had other things on my mind; but being a dutiful grandson, I made some time and headed down to Grampa Tom’s place in Wilmington.
As I pulled my Jeep off Oleander, the familiar off-white sand and long-needle pine trees reminded me of earlier days visiting Grampa. The house had since become his ‘Hermitage’ and was sorely in need of repair.
“You gotta be kiddin’ me!” I said aloud, noticing the overgrown yard and neglected porch. Grampa’s boat sat in the yard, not looking very seaworthy.
“Don’t sell ‘er short,” said a scratchy voice from within. “She’s withstood everything Ol’ Lady Nature could throw. Come in, Tom.”
“Grampa Tom?” I said, pulling open the storm door.
“Come in and sit down. There’s a few things to go over and I feel something powerful pulling at me.”
“How are you doing?” I tried to sound like I could do something about it if the answer was bad.
“Oh! Me? I’m doing great! I just can’t stay long. Got places to go and I’m packin’ light. No one takes a knapsack into heaven.”
I smiled – I was in the right place. Gramps was his old enigmatic self.
“What’s up, Grampa?”
“Sit down. There’s history to impart.”
I pulled up a straight-backed chair, the only one in sight, and sat down to await the ramblings of the colorful old dodger with a patient smile.
“Don’t gimme that smile; that’s your father’s smile, I’d know it anywhere. It’s that ‘Go on, rattle away’ smile I always get from him. Listen up, this is important.”
“OK, OK, sorry,” I said, pulling my chair a half-inch closer and trying not to do my father’s cynical smile.
“Why do you think you’re a Donnalson?” He flashed an elfish twinkle.
“Never thought about it.” It was true. I hadn’t.
“Why not a Donnallton or a Donnally or” he paused to be sure he had my attention, then said with great import, “a Donny.”
The old man sat back, smiling, waiting for the light bulb to go off in my head. When it didn’t, the luster faded from his face.
“Alright, boy, I can see I’m in for it. It was easy for me to change it to Donnalson. It was wartime, records were slippery – Giuseppe Verde became Joe Green due to anti-Italian sentiment, Viktor Schmidt became Vic Smith, and so on. Lots of people changed their names, but I changed it because Donnallton was getting a bit familiar in these parts.”
“Why?”
“For the same reason that my grandfather changed it from Donnally and his grandfather changed it from Donny – Blackbeard’s treasure.”
My eyebrows went up.
“I see I have your attention.” He sat back with a satisfied smile.
Friday, October 16, 2009
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 6
Sophie Keaton opened her eyes. She sat up, listening. Was it a dream? Or did she hear a shotgun?
It could have been a dream; the memory of waking up to that very sound when she was six, going out to find her mother lying in the front yard. Her father, drunk and barely able to stand, leaning on his shotgun, was cussing her. “You'll never question me again, you shrew!” he screamed. After that she stayed with her aunt in Thaxter country until she was old enough to run away from home without anyone coming after her.
It could have been a dream. But it didn't seem like a dream, it sounded different, not so close up. Sophie put on her robe and went to the back door.
Out through the trees lay Thompson Bog, a place to stay away from, day or night. Lights shone in the distance and she felt a chill that was not from the growing cold of the night. She walked in her bare feet down through the yard to the edge of the trees, when she stopped suddenly. There was a voice. It was the voice of the man who had just left her, Chief McLean.
“Somebody call for an ambulance! Can anybody hear me?” screamed McLean. As Al Gaither came upon him, McLean sat holding Martha Sawyer in his arms, her eyes were glazed over and blood poured from her side. On the bog, a dark figure stood up in a small boat. The man lost his footing and steadied himself with his shotgun.
“Dare we move her?” yelled Al, trying to assess the situation.
“I don't know. She's been shot.”
“I'll go for help. The hospital is not far,” Al yelled over his shoulder as he turned and headed for his car.
McLean called after him, “Sophie Keaton's house is on the way, up Turner's Trace, she's got a phone, that'll save time.”
Al ran as fast as he could, then stopped short at the chief's Chrysler; the keys were still in it. He jumped inside and sped down the road, the last instruction still ringing in his ears.
As he pulled out of the dirt lane onto the two-lane blacktop, he narrowly missed hitting Harlen Eldridge's car. Eldridge recognized the face of his hired detective in the chief's car and followed for news. He spun around and drove after the big Chrysler toward Sophie's place.
Sophie was just opening the front door when the Chief's Chrysler pulled into her driveway. But it was not the chief who got out, it was a stranger.
“I need to use your phone. Chief McLean says you've got one.”
“In here,” said Sophie and she threw the door open. She had heard her name yelled across the swamp by the man who had left her less than an hour before. Now came a stranger in his car to use the phone.
“Hospital? I need an ambulance right away, it's an emergency, someone's been shot. Down Old New Hope Church Road to Thompson Bog.”
As he followed his hired private eye in the chief's car, Harlen Eldridge saw a familiar Ford tearing down the two-lane at breakneck speed; it was his son-in-law, the detective. Harlen slowed a little, letting the Ford get some distance, then made a u-turn and sped up to keep pace. One thing was for sure, thought Harlen, Frank knew the way. They were heading for the Miller place.
Chief McLean sat on the ground holding Martha Sawyer's head on his lap. He smoothed her forehead with his left hand as he held his handkerchief to the wound at her side with his right.
“Don't you worry, Martha. Ambulance is comin', then they'll get you to the hospital and fix you up proper.”
Out on the bog, the dim lantern bobbed gently, set in motion by Collin Miller trying to steady himself in the unstable boat. He had shot at a prowler, someone who came to take his Clara. Now he was standing in water and his boat was sinking.
Off to one side of the pier, a figure was rising as if out of the swamp. The strange, formless shape limped across the few feet of swampland that separated them and into the beam of Chief McLean's flashlight, lying on the ground next to him. It was Ed Riggs.
Before either could speak, the roar of a car engine caught them. The black Ford pulled up to the trailer and skidded to a stop. Without turning the lights or engine off, Frank Morton got out, his gun was drawn.
Behind the Ford, another pair of lights appeared. The large Chrysler slid to a stop behind Morton's car and the door flew open.
Frank Morton saw the figure, dark and formless behind the bright beams. The man raised what looked like a rifle and yelled, “Morton!”
Morton fired. The man faltered. He fired again. The man staggered against the car, slumping into the light from the dome through the open door. Frank fired a third shot before he realized that his target was Harlen Eldridge. What he thought was a rifle had been his father-in-law's walking cane.
Frank felt the pistol taken from his hand, his arms pulled behind him and handcuffs closed on his wrists. He slowly turned his head to see Chief McLean's unmistakable scowl directed at him. Beyond the chief lay Martha Sawyer, her head on the muddy lap of Ed Riggs. The sinking feeling that he felt a moment before continued as he realized that he had all but confessed to Ed Riggs, the man still alive and sitting on the ground next to Thompson Bog.
Ed Riggs sat on the front stoop of the Miller trailer in the glow of the single bare bulb from inside and the headlights from three police cars. The doctor was dressing his leg. Chief McLean came up and rested a foot on the stoop.
“You gonna be OK?” he asked his Detective Sergeant.
“Yeah, Jethro, now I am. The Miller girl is in the swamp, weighed down - I think by the cinder-block anchor from old man Miller's boat.”
“Yeah, we figured. Miller's devastated, but he's also under arrest for shooting Martha.”
“She gonna pull through?”
Chief McLean looked at the disappearing taillights, the waning siren as the ambulance jostled up the dirt road back to the county highway. “I don't know. She was hit pretty bad. She came out here looking for you, you know.”
“She's a good girl. And Frank?” asked Ed.
Chief McLean sucked in a hard breath.
“In cuffs. He shot Harlen Eldridge in cold blood. My guess is he killed the Miller girl too.”
“Yeah, that's my guess too. I think she might have put the screws to him, wanted him to leave his wife or she'd tell, something like that. There's a mark on her head could have been a pistol butt.”
“You saw her up close?” Chief McLean turned back to look at the detective's face in the glow of the car lights.
“Yeah. It's a picture that I won't get out of my head soon.”
Martha Sawyer died from her wounds before she reached the hospital. She was never aware that they had found Ed Riggs in the swamp.
Collin Miller was charged with murder. He died in jail of a heart attack while awaiting trial.
Ed Riggs filled out his report and went home for a much needed rest.
Chief McLean went back to Sophie's place where he poured himself a stiff drink and fell asleep on her lap.
Edna Morton eventually divorced her husband, liquidated her holdings and moved out of state, returning to her maiden name of Eldridge.
Frank Morton was charged with the murder of his father-in-law and that of Clara Miller. The Miller girl was found to have been pregnant at the time of her death. Frank received consecutive life sentences.
Al Gaither returned home to find his wife waiting up for him. She looked up from her book. “Rough night?” she asked. “No, about usual,” he replied.
To this day, no one has moved into the trailer at Thompson Bog.
Sophie Keaton opened her eyes. She sat up, listening. Was it a dream? Or did she hear a shotgun?
It could have been a dream; the memory of waking up to that very sound when she was six, going out to find her mother lying in the front yard. Her father, drunk and barely able to stand, leaning on his shotgun, was cussing her. “You'll never question me again, you shrew!” he screamed. After that she stayed with her aunt in Thaxter country until she was old enough to run away from home without anyone coming after her.
It could have been a dream. But it didn't seem like a dream, it sounded different, not so close up. Sophie put on her robe and went to the back door.
Out through the trees lay Thompson Bog, a place to stay away from, day or night. Lights shone in the distance and she felt a chill that was not from the growing cold of the night. She walked in her bare feet down through the yard to the edge of the trees, when she stopped suddenly. There was a voice. It was the voice of the man who had just left her, Chief McLean.
“Somebody call for an ambulance! Can anybody hear me?” screamed McLean. As Al Gaither came upon him, McLean sat holding Martha Sawyer in his arms, her eyes were glazed over and blood poured from her side. On the bog, a dark figure stood up in a small boat. The man lost his footing and steadied himself with his shotgun.
“Dare we move her?” yelled Al, trying to assess the situation.
“I don't know. She's been shot.”
“I'll go for help. The hospital is not far,” Al yelled over his shoulder as he turned and headed for his car.
McLean called after him, “Sophie Keaton's house is on the way, up Turner's Trace, she's got a phone, that'll save time.”
Al ran as fast as he could, then stopped short at the chief's Chrysler; the keys were still in it. He jumped inside and sped down the road, the last instruction still ringing in his ears.
As he pulled out of the dirt lane onto the two-lane blacktop, he narrowly missed hitting Harlen Eldridge's car. Eldridge recognized the face of his hired detective in the chief's car and followed for news. He spun around and drove after the big Chrysler toward Sophie's place.
Sophie was just opening the front door when the Chief's Chrysler pulled into her driveway. But it was not the chief who got out, it was a stranger.
“I need to use your phone. Chief McLean says you've got one.”
“In here,” said Sophie and she threw the door open. She had heard her name yelled across the swamp by the man who had left her less than an hour before. Now came a stranger in his car to use the phone.
“Hospital? I need an ambulance right away, it's an emergency, someone's been shot. Down Old New Hope Church Road to Thompson Bog.”
As he followed his hired private eye in the chief's car, Harlen Eldridge saw a familiar Ford tearing down the two-lane at breakneck speed; it was his son-in-law, the detective. Harlen slowed a little, letting the Ford get some distance, then made a u-turn and sped up to keep pace. One thing was for sure, thought Harlen, Frank knew the way. They were heading for the Miller place.
Chief McLean sat on the ground holding Martha Sawyer's head on his lap. He smoothed her forehead with his left hand as he held his handkerchief to the wound at her side with his right.
“Don't you worry, Martha. Ambulance is comin', then they'll get you to the hospital and fix you up proper.”
Out on the bog, the dim lantern bobbed gently, set in motion by Collin Miller trying to steady himself in the unstable boat. He had shot at a prowler, someone who came to take his Clara. Now he was standing in water and his boat was sinking.
Off to one side of the pier, a figure was rising as if out of the swamp. The strange, formless shape limped across the few feet of swampland that separated them and into the beam of Chief McLean's flashlight, lying on the ground next to him. It was Ed Riggs.
Before either could speak, the roar of a car engine caught them. The black Ford pulled up to the trailer and skidded to a stop. Without turning the lights or engine off, Frank Morton got out, his gun was drawn.
Behind the Ford, another pair of lights appeared. The large Chrysler slid to a stop behind Morton's car and the door flew open.
Frank Morton saw the figure, dark and formless behind the bright beams. The man raised what looked like a rifle and yelled, “Morton!”
Morton fired. The man faltered. He fired again. The man staggered against the car, slumping into the light from the dome through the open door. Frank fired a third shot before he realized that his target was Harlen Eldridge. What he thought was a rifle had been his father-in-law's walking cane.
Frank felt the pistol taken from his hand, his arms pulled behind him and handcuffs closed on his wrists. He slowly turned his head to see Chief McLean's unmistakable scowl directed at him. Beyond the chief lay Martha Sawyer, her head on the muddy lap of Ed Riggs. The sinking feeling that he felt a moment before continued as he realized that he had all but confessed to Ed Riggs, the man still alive and sitting on the ground next to Thompson Bog.
Ed Riggs sat on the front stoop of the Miller trailer in the glow of the single bare bulb from inside and the headlights from three police cars. The doctor was dressing his leg. Chief McLean came up and rested a foot on the stoop.
“You gonna be OK?” he asked his Detective Sergeant.
“Yeah, Jethro, now I am. The Miller girl is in the swamp, weighed down - I think by the cinder-block anchor from old man Miller's boat.”
“Yeah, we figured. Miller's devastated, but he's also under arrest for shooting Martha.”
“She gonna pull through?”
Chief McLean looked at the disappearing taillights, the waning siren as the ambulance jostled up the dirt road back to the county highway. “I don't know. She was hit pretty bad. She came out here looking for you, you know.”
“She's a good girl. And Frank?” asked Ed.
Chief McLean sucked in a hard breath.
“In cuffs. He shot Harlen Eldridge in cold blood. My guess is he killed the Miller girl too.”
“Yeah, that's my guess too. I think she might have put the screws to him, wanted him to leave his wife or she'd tell, something like that. There's a mark on her head could have been a pistol butt.”
“You saw her up close?” Chief McLean turned back to look at the detective's face in the glow of the car lights.
“Yeah. It's a picture that I won't get out of my head soon.”
Martha Sawyer died from her wounds before she reached the hospital. She was never aware that they had found Ed Riggs in the swamp.
Collin Miller was charged with murder. He died in jail of a heart attack while awaiting trial.
Ed Riggs filled out his report and went home for a much needed rest.
Chief McLean went back to Sophie's place where he poured himself a stiff drink and fell asleep on her lap.
Edna Morton eventually divorced her husband, liquidated her holdings and moved out of state, returning to her maiden name of Eldridge.
Frank Morton was charged with the murder of his father-in-law and that of Clara Miller. The Miller girl was found to have been pregnant at the time of her death. Frank received consecutive life sentences.
Al Gaither returned home to find his wife waiting up for him. She looked up from her book. “Rough night?” she asked. “No, about usual,” he replied.
To this day, no one has moved into the trailer at Thompson Bog.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 5
Ed Riggs groaned as he pulled himself into a sitting position. He was sitting on cold, damp ground, but it was solid. He reached into the water and brought a handful up, pouring it over his calf where the sharp pain fixed his attention. The water felt good on his leg. He touched his pants and found them torn. On his calf was an open wound, a gash. It wasn't deep, but it hurt like the blazes.
He looked around, but couldn't see anything near that would give him a hand up. The trees were smooth with no low-hanging branches. The pier was too far to reach; he had drifted, as did the body of Clara Miller, away from the old pier. There was nothing to do but to sit there and gather his strength. He certainly wasn't going to walk through the swamp with one shoe and an open wound.
He wondered if Clara was pregnant. Did that spark an argument? Frank was easy enough to argue with. There wasn't much you could say to him that didn't illicit a negative response. If she announced she had become pregnant, that could have sealed her fate. Frank didn't want kids. That's just one of the many things that Harlan had against him, that he would never be a grandfather while Frank was wielding the baby-maker.
Ed lay back on the cold, hard ground. His hand fell to his side and into the water, letting him know that he was just inches away from the swamp.
Inches. His life was just spared by inches. Clara had died by inches. The fear in her eyes, the mouth frozen in a silent scream, showed that she probably was still alive when she went under. The coroner would probably find for murder-by-drowning rather than blunt-force-trauma, the mark of the gun butt notwithstanding.
He strained his ears for sounds of engines, of shouting, of someone coming to search for him. If he wanted to, Frank could summon up to six officers to join in the search without even trying. If he roused the town's folk, he could get 30 or more out. But he had just sat there, squatting on the pier, talking to him in his soft voice, the voice that told Ed Riggs everything he needed to know.
“Sorry,” he had said. But Frank Morton wasn't sorry. The soft voice held a sneer that told a different story. Ed Riggs had to face facts, Frank Morton wanted him dead and only left without further violence because he thought that was already the case.
Out on the dirt road, through the trees, came the sound of a car engine, then another. Lights came through the trees and down the dirt road. They drove up to the trailer and stopped. First one light, then another, shown through the complete darkness. Help was on the way.
Al Gaither pulled his car around the far end of the property to a place where he could see the Miller trailer. He was driving without headlights, hoping he wouldn't run into anything, or anyone. He cut the engine a distance from the trailer. He had long since removed the inside bulb, so no light went on when he opened the door. He left the door open, partly so it wouldn't be heard closing and partly to facilitate a fast getaway if needed.
The Miller trailer was dark. It could be he was too early and the lovers were still entwined, or that he was too late and the man had already left. He settled in for a long night in case it was the former.
There was a light that caught his eye, but it wasn't in the trailer, it was off in the swamp. An oil lamp shown through the trees from the bog, slightly moving. Someone had a light going in a small boat.
Al stood up and moved quietly forward. As he moved around the trailer, he noticed that the black Ford was not there. Perhaps he was too late and the visitor was already gone. The Miller girl was probably in her bed fast asleep, looking innocent for when her father came home from his shift in a few hours.
Two headlights came into view down the dirt road from the county highway, headlights moving toward the swamp, toward him as well. It wasn't the Ford that was usually there, the lover; it was a Chevy wagon.
Soon another joined it, a big car, with one dim headlight.
He went around the trailer to see who had arrived. There was still dust settling where the cars had driven up the road. They stopped at the trailer and doors were opened and closed. A flashlight beam broke the darkness. In the beam a man could be seen. There was a short exchange, then the man went to his trunk and brought out a second flashlight.
Together, both beams moved toward the small pier jutting out into the swamp. Al moved closer to find out who took interest in the pier at this late hour. He moved past the trailer, past the two cars toward the pair of flashlight beams. He was about to call out, when he heard the blast of a shotgun.
From the mound where he lay, Ed Riggs looked across the patch of swamp and the Miller yard beyond to where the two cars had stopped. Two flashlight beams were walking toward the pier where he had fallen. They were not that far away, he could yell to them, he thought. But he couldn't get the strength or breath to yell. He tried, but made a weak squeal instead.
He had figured out who killed Clara Miller and felt a renewed sense of purpose. He had to get back to the station, to call the coroner, to call the chief, to find his partner – the one who left him to die. But his body was fighting him, too weak and injured to comply. He looked around, trying to find a way to begin his new quest, to cry out to the searchers, to be rescued and take command of the situation once more. Then he heard the sound of a shotgun blast too close for comfort.
Collin Miller sat in his boat lulled to sleep by the crystal-clear brew the Belter boys had sold him and the gentle lapping of the water against his flat-bottomed boat. He snored himself awake, jerking a bit and having to recover his balance.
He noticed that the caulking had come loose again and the boat was slowly filling up, his boots were in an inch-and-a-half of water. He decided it might be time to go back in. He took the shotgun from his lap and began to lean it against the the seat so he could work the oars.
That's when he noticed the lights in his yard. They couldn't have spotted his truck, which he left in the woods behind his place. They must be coming for something, maybe his boat, which they couldn't see was missing from the pier. Maybe it was Clara's lover, and he's brought a friend. Maybe they were gonna have a party. He would fix 'em!
Collin Miller raised the shotgun and aimed it at the lights just coming onto the pier. He pulled the trigger and the gun went off, knocking him back into the boat, into the inch-and-a-half of water.
The sound shook Harlen Eldridge from his half-sleep. The empty glass fell from his hand and the sound as it hit the wooden porch made him wonder if he had really heard a shotgun report. Perhaps he just imagined it.
No, he was sure, it had been a shotgun. He grasped his ivory-handled walking stick and struggled up to his feet. The sound had come from the other side of the bog that bordered his land. There were some shacks over there, who-knows-what-all lived in them. Some trailers too, poor white trash or worse.
Harlen looked at the pictures still in his left hand and looked up across the yard to the trees that hid the swampland beyond from view. Could it be that old man Miller had found a solution, right or wrong, and had set it into play? Surely Gaither would have been there to record it all on film. Surely the police would come soon and see what the ruckus was. But what if it was something else? What else? He didn't know, but he had to be sure.
He opened the screen door and picked up the keys lying inside on the side table, turned back and hobbled down the stairs to the new Chrysler sedan sitting in front of the house at the near loop of the circular drive. He climbed into the driver's seat, turned on the lights and started it up. He headed toward the highway that would lead to the dirt road leading to the place where the pictures were taken, to where his son-in-law besmirched the family name with an underage trailer whore.
Frank Morton jerked awake. Did he forget to turn the television off? There was a noise that sounded like a shot. He rolled over to look at the clock and fell off of the couch onto the floor, hitting his head on the coffee table in the process. He struggled up from the floor. The television was still on, but there was a test pattern, not a show. The western was over, as was all programing for the day. Frank got up and switched the television off, then went to the front door. Outside a few neighborhood dogs were barking at the sudden noise that woke them as well as him, but all was still otherwise.
Then Frank Morton got a flash of an idea that made his eyes go wide. Had Miller gotten home and found some evidence of him? Had someone found the Miller girl's body, or Ed Riggs? Had the shotgun report been at someone mistaken for the crimes? Or at shadows in the swamp? In either case, he knew he had to somehow insert himself into the middle of the investigation to turn suspicion in other directions.
Frank grabbed his coat from the door, ran down the three steps to his car and started it up. In the side mirror he could see his wife's face appear at the window to see where he was off to at this hour. He saw her face diminish in the mirror as he sped down the gravel path to the two-lane that would lead him to Thompson Bog.
Ed Riggs groaned as he pulled himself into a sitting position. He was sitting on cold, damp ground, but it was solid. He reached into the water and brought a handful up, pouring it over his calf where the sharp pain fixed his attention. The water felt good on his leg. He touched his pants and found them torn. On his calf was an open wound, a gash. It wasn't deep, but it hurt like the blazes.
He looked around, but couldn't see anything near that would give him a hand up. The trees were smooth with no low-hanging branches. The pier was too far to reach; he had drifted, as did the body of Clara Miller, away from the old pier. There was nothing to do but to sit there and gather his strength. He certainly wasn't going to walk through the swamp with one shoe and an open wound.
He wondered if Clara was pregnant. Did that spark an argument? Frank was easy enough to argue with. There wasn't much you could say to him that didn't illicit a negative response. If she announced she had become pregnant, that could have sealed her fate. Frank didn't want kids. That's just one of the many things that Harlan had against him, that he would never be a grandfather while Frank was wielding the baby-maker.
Ed lay back on the cold, hard ground. His hand fell to his side and into the water, letting him know that he was just inches away from the swamp.
Inches. His life was just spared by inches. Clara had died by inches. The fear in her eyes, the mouth frozen in a silent scream, showed that she probably was still alive when she went under. The coroner would probably find for murder-by-drowning rather than blunt-force-trauma, the mark of the gun butt notwithstanding.
He strained his ears for sounds of engines, of shouting, of someone coming to search for him. If he wanted to, Frank could summon up to six officers to join in the search without even trying. If he roused the town's folk, he could get 30 or more out. But he had just sat there, squatting on the pier, talking to him in his soft voice, the voice that told Ed Riggs everything he needed to know.
“Sorry,” he had said. But Frank Morton wasn't sorry. The soft voice held a sneer that told a different story. Ed Riggs had to face facts, Frank Morton wanted him dead and only left without further violence because he thought that was already the case.
Out on the dirt road, through the trees, came the sound of a car engine, then another. Lights came through the trees and down the dirt road. They drove up to the trailer and stopped. First one light, then another, shown through the complete darkness. Help was on the way.
Al Gaither pulled his car around the far end of the property to a place where he could see the Miller trailer. He was driving without headlights, hoping he wouldn't run into anything, or anyone. He cut the engine a distance from the trailer. He had long since removed the inside bulb, so no light went on when he opened the door. He left the door open, partly so it wouldn't be heard closing and partly to facilitate a fast getaway if needed.
The Miller trailer was dark. It could be he was too early and the lovers were still entwined, or that he was too late and the man had already left. He settled in for a long night in case it was the former.
There was a light that caught his eye, but it wasn't in the trailer, it was off in the swamp. An oil lamp shown through the trees from the bog, slightly moving. Someone had a light going in a small boat.
Al stood up and moved quietly forward. As he moved around the trailer, he noticed that the black Ford was not there. Perhaps he was too late and the visitor was already gone. The Miller girl was probably in her bed fast asleep, looking innocent for when her father came home from his shift in a few hours.
Two headlights came into view down the dirt road from the county highway, headlights moving toward the swamp, toward him as well. It wasn't the Ford that was usually there, the lover; it was a Chevy wagon.
Soon another joined it, a big car, with one dim headlight.
He went around the trailer to see who had arrived. There was still dust settling where the cars had driven up the road. They stopped at the trailer and doors were opened and closed. A flashlight beam broke the darkness. In the beam a man could be seen. There was a short exchange, then the man went to his trunk and brought out a second flashlight.
Together, both beams moved toward the small pier jutting out into the swamp. Al moved closer to find out who took interest in the pier at this late hour. He moved past the trailer, past the two cars toward the pair of flashlight beams. He was about to call out, when he heard the blast of a shotgun.
From the mound where he lay, Ed Riggs looked across the patch of swamp and the Miller yard beyond to where the two cars had stopped. Two flashlight beams were walking toward the pier where he had fallen. They were not that far away, he could yell to them, he thought. But he couldn't get the strength or breath to yell. He tried, but made a weak squeal instead.
He had figured out who killed Clara Miller and felt a renewed sense of purpose. He had to get back to the station, to call the coroner, to call the chief, to find his partner – the one who left him to die. But his body was fighting him, too weak and injured to comply. He looked around, trying to find a way to begin his new quest, to cry out to the searchers, to be rescued and take command of the situation once more. Then he heard the sound of a shotgun blast too close for comfort.
Collin Miller sat in his boat lulled to sleep by the crystal-clear brew the Belter boys had sold him and the gentle lapping of the water against his flat-bottomed boat. He snored himself awake, jerking a bit and having to recover his balance.
He noticed that the caulking had come loose again and the boat was slowly filling up, his boots were in an inch-and-a-half of water. He decided it might be time to go back in. He took the shotgun from his lap and began to lean it against the the seat so he could work the oars.
That's when he noticed the lights in his yard. They couldn't have spotted his truck, which he left in the woods behind his place. They must be coming for something, maybe his boat, which they couldn't see was missing from the pier. Maybe it was Clara's lover, and he's brought a friend. Maybe they were gonna have a party. He would fix 'em!
Collin Miller raised the shotgun and aimed it at the lights just coming onto the pier. He pulled the trigger and the gun went off, knocking him back into the boat, into the inch-and-a-half of water.
The sound shook Harlen Eldridge from his half-sleep. The empty glass fell from his hand and the sound as it hit the wooden porch made him wonder if he had really heard a shotgun report. Perhaps he just imagined it.
No, he was sure, it had been a shotgun. He grasped his ivory-handled walking stick and struggled up to his feet. The sound had come from the other side of the bog that bordered his land. There were some shacks over there, who-knows-what-all lived in them. Some trailers too, poor white trash or worse.
Harlen looked at the pictures still in his left hand and looked up across the yard to the trees that hid the swampland beyond from view. Could it be that old man Miller had found a solution, right or wrong, and had set it into play? Surely Gaither would have been there to record it all on film. Surely the police would come soon and see what the ruckus was. But what if it was something else? What else? He didn't know, but he had to be sure.
He opened the screen door and picked up the keys lying inside on the side table, turned back and hobbled down the stairs to the new Chrysler sedan sitting in front of the house at the near loop of the circular drive. He climbed into the driver's seat, turned on the lights and started it up. He headed toward the highway that would lead to the dirt road leading to the place where the pictures were taken, to where his son-in-law besmirched the family name with an underage trailer whore.
Frank Morton jerked awake. Did he forget to turn the television off? There was a noise that sounded like a shot. He rolled over to look at the clock and fell off of the couch onto the floor, hitting his head on the coffee table in the process. He struggled up from the floor. The television was still on, but there was a test pattern, not a show. The western was over, as was all programing for the day. Frank got up and switched the television off, then went to the front door. Outside a few neighborhood dogs were barking at the sudden noise that woke them as well as him, but all was still otherwise.
Then Frank Morton got a flash of an idea that made his eyes go wide. Had Miller gotten home and found some evidence of him? Had someone found the Miller girl's body, or Ed Riggs? Had the shotgun report been at someone mistaken for the crimes? Or at shadows in the swamp? In either case, he knew he had to somehow insert himself into the middle of the investigation to turn suspicion in other directions.
Frank grabbed his coat from the door, ran down the three steps to his car and started it up. In the side mirror he could see his wife's face appear at the window to see where he was off to at this hour. He saw her face diminish in the mirror as he sped down the gravel path to the two-lane that would lead him to Thompson Bog.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 4
Police Chief Jethro McLean took a few bills out of his wallet and laid them on the dresser. He took one look back at the naked body in the bed. “Good night, Sophie.”
“'Night, Jethro,” came a sleepy voice from the bed.
Chief McLean walked out into the night, around the line of small cabins to the parking lot and climbed into his car, a four-year-old Chrysler. As the Chief, he drove a newer car, but newer cars got noticed and he didn't feel like being noticed tonight; he drove the older one.
As he pulled out onto the main road, he thought to himself that he had things pretty well covered. After all, his wife knew about his mistress and didn't care, his mistress knew he wasn't going to leave his wife and didn't care, and his best detective was busy solving all the outstanding cases. He didn't have a care in the world.
As police chief, he could have pulled the car over that passed him going so fast, but he had just come from Sophie's and he didn't really feel like it. But as the car went by, easily twenty miles over the limit, it was not that it was speeding that distracted him, but that it was familiar; he knew that car. It was Martha Sawyer's car. Now where was she going in such a hurry?
Chief McLean stepped on the pedal and followed the tail lights of the disappearing Chevy wagon. Martha had worked for him 13 years and he had never known her to break a law, even a speed limit. There had to be an emergency.
Ed Riggs let go of the rope that held Clara Miller close to him. He watched her drift away, slowly sinking into the black water of the bog. Her eyes showed no protest as they slipped beneath the surface, disappearing into the thick, slimy water. He drew a deep, musky breath and tried to focus on the task at hand. Clara Miller's life was gone, but his was still intact.
Ed Riggs pulled himself up through the giant roots, completely out of the water. His overcoat was gone. His gun was gone and the holster was torn. One of his shoes was gone, sucked down in the mud. He fell back on the dry mound that met his hand and gave thanks for being alive. He decided to rest before considering any next steps.
The darkness that surrounded him, the overcast day that was now turning into night, brought no light to shine on the mystery of Clara Miller. She had been murdered, that much was clear. Old man Miller was nowhere to be found. His partner had all but confessed to the deed. But why? If he killed her, why blurt out words that could be construed as a confession? Unless he was sure that the Detective Sergeant would soon be dead. Then why not put a bullet through him and be sure? Was Detective Morton as big an idiot as was generally thought?
The sight of the Miller girl came back into his head. He wanted to force it out, but it wouldn't go. There was something about it that didn't look right; something just as she sank into the bog. Yes, it was her forehead, there was a mark on it, an indentation. It looked just like a gun butt.
Then Ed remembered Frank, his partner, his junior detective, looking at him and not lifting a finger to pull him from the bog as he sank deeper. He remembers what he said, about meeting the Miller girl. Frank knew the Miller girl was down there. Frank could have taken the oar from Miller's boat and reached him, but he didn't. He could have jumped in the shallow part and saved his boss's life, but he didn't.
“Sorry”, Frank had said with a shallow laugh. Ed remembered how Frank had laughed. It filled him with conflicting thoughts and feelings. He remembered the years in uniform, when they came up through the ranks together, how when Ed was made detective, how he brought Frank along and vouched for him. He had mentored the man out of friendship, made him his partner. When Ed made sergeant he kept Frank with him, covering for his mistakes, thinking of his wife's family, who would hold it over him forever if he didn't succeed.
Frank had married up, Edna's folks were not stinking rich, as it were, but they were well off. If they hadn't been, Frank wouldn't have been able to afford that lovely house and new car. He pictured the new '54 Fairlane, Edna getting out of it with her short stole as Frank held the door. Edna was a fashion statement but all their friends knew that it was daddy's money, not Frank's. He had made detective, with Ed's help, but couldn't seem to advance further. Edna's family never let Frank forget that he was lucky to have her; he was, after all a mere Morton, not an Eldridge like them. Ed guessed the disdain of his family drove Frank to the arms of the easily impressed girl from the poor side of town.
Clara Miller was trailer trash of the first order. She was all curves and short-shorts, bursting out of her top and completely out of control. Old man Miller had no rein on her. She was a hopeless flirt.
Frank wouldn't have left his wife to marry Clara, no matter what. To leave his wife would be to leave the family money. Clara was young and pretty but still poor white trash and he was not about to leave the crest of the hill for the edge of the bog. There was little doubt that Frank had slipped off with the Miller girl, or that he was probably the one who killed her. Her hair and blood might still be on the butt of his pistol.
“He's probably telling them right now that his partner is dead, slipped beneath the swamp never to be seen again,” Ed thought. There might be a search, but Frank would convince them it would be fruitless. He would point them in a different direction.
Still, a search could happen. It was better to believe a search could be in the works than not. If they came this way, they'd find him and he would be saved. Of course, he'd have to arrest Frank at the earliest opportunity and take that gun away from him.
Martha Sawyer had locked up the police station and pushed her green Chevrolet station wagon as hard as she dared out the old dirt road to Thompson Bog, the muddy depression that was the only swamp land in Landon County. She had taken the strongest light she could find and her winter boots. She was not going to give up without a search. Ed Riggs was too good a man to just let die in the swamp; someone had to at least try to find him. She didn't notice that the car she passed on the two-lane blacktop was her boss; she only knew that the headlights were not fading away behind her fast enough. Whoever it was she had passed was now chasing her.
Martha reached into the glove box and took out the .38 revolver. If this was someone who was a danger, he would not find her a willing victim.
The lights picked up behind her and Martha stepped harder on the gas, nearly going off the road at Turner's Trace. The wheels hit dirt and spun as a flume of dirt and mud flew up behind the wagon. Back on pavement again, the wagon shot forward with a jerk, then lurched as she spun the wheel, pulling onto Old New Hope Church Road and down toward the wetlands where the Miller trailer stood.
At the wide spot in the road, the broken-down trailer and the ratty remains of a small pier were the only sign that man had ever put a foot here. The clouds hid the moon and stars, leaving only a few remaining lightning bugs to give any natural light.
Martha pulled the car up, spraying the cat tails with light. Small animals scurried for cover as Martha got out of the car and turned on her flashlight. She started toward the pier.
Behind her a second pair of headlights pulled up and the chief's Chrysler came to a stop next to the station wagon. Martha turned ready for battle, then stopped and lowered her pistol when she saw it was Chief McLean.
“Martha, what the hell are you up to?” yelled McLean.
“Chief, don't come up on me like that, I nearly shot you for a poacher.”
“Well, who did you expect? Why aren't you at the office or home? What are you up to out here at this hour?”
“You haven't heard? The swamp took Ed Riggs. He was out here looking for the Miller girl with Frank and fell in. Frank came back saying he was a goner for sure but wasn't going to look for him. I just figured I wasn't going to let it go at that; someone's go to at least try, for Pete's sake!”
“Ed gone? When did this happen?”
“Within the hour. I left as soon as Frank was gone.”
“So where's Frank? Is he out here?” said the chief, looking around, half expecting to see his only remaining detective.
“No,” said Martha, sharply. “He went home to get a good rest so he can start fresh in the morning, he said. He's already moved into Ed's desk. I'm out here alone.”
“And with a gun, I see.” said the chief, looking at Martha's pistol. “Is that standard issue?”
“I'm not coming out here unarmed. You can site me in the morning, but tonight, I'm going looking for Ed Riggs and not coming home without him or his body.” Martha turned sharply and began walking toward the pier.
“Wait up a minute,” said McLean. He went to his trunk, opened it and came out with a flashlight and a pump-action shotgun. “As long as you're going to do something crazy, you may as well have company.”
Police Chief Jethro McLean took a few bills out of his wallet and laid them on the dresser. He took one look back at the naked body in the bed. “Good night, Sophie.”
“'Night, Jethro,” came a sleepy voice from the bed.
Chief McLean walked out into the night, around the line of small cabins to the parking lot and climbed into his car, a four-year-old Chrysler. As the Chief, he drove a newer car, but newer cars got noticed and he didn't feel like being noticed tonight; he drove the older one.
As he pulled out onto the main road, he thought to himself that he had things pretty well covered. After all, his wife knew about his mistress and didn't care, his mistress knew he wasn't going to leave his wife and didn't care, and his best detective was busy solving all the outstanding cases. He didn't have a care in the world.
As police chief, he could have pulled the car over that passed him going so fast, but he had just come from Sophie's and he didn't really feel like it. But as the car went by, easily twenty miles over the limit, it was not that it was speeding that distracted him, but that it was familiar; he knew that car. It was Martha Sawyer's car. Now where was she going in such a hurry?
Chief McLean stepped on the pedal and followed the tail lights of the disappearing Chevy wagon. Martha had worked for him 13 years and he had never known her to break a law, even a speed limit. There had to be an emergency.
Ed Riggs let go of the rope that held Clara Miller close to him. He watched her drift away, slowly sinking into the black water of the bog. Her eyes showed no protest as they slipped beneath the surface, disappearing into the thick, slimy water. He drew a deep, musky breath and tried to focus on the task at hand. Clara Miller's life was gone, but his was still intact.
Ed Riggs pulled himself up through the giant roots, completely out of the water. His overcoat was gone. His gun was gone and the holster was torn. One of his shoes was gone, sucked down in the mud. He fell back on the dry mound that met his hand and gave thanks for being alive. He decided to rest before considering any next steps.
The darkness that surrounded him, the overcast day that was now turning into night, brought no light to shine on the mystery of Clara Miller. She had been murdered, that much was clear. Old man Miller was nowhere to be found. His partner had all but confessed to the deed. But why? If he killed her, why blurt out words that could be construed as a confession? Unless he was sure that the Detective Sergeant would soon be dead. Then why not put a bullet through him and be sure? Was Detective Morton as big an idiot as was generally thought?
The sight of the Miller girl came back into his head. He wanted to force it out, but it wouldn't go. There was something about it that didn't look right; something just as she sank into the bog. Yes, it was her forehead, there was a mark on it, an indentation. It looked just like a gun butt.
Then Ed remembered Frank, his partner, his junior detective, looking at him and not lifting a finger to pull him from the bog as he sank deeper. He remembers what he said, about meeting the Miller girl. Frank knew the Miller girl was down there. Frank could have taken the oar from Miller's boat and reached him, but he didn't. He could have jumped in the shallow part and saved his boss's life, but he didn't.
“Sorry”, Frank had said with a shallow laugh. Ed remembered how Frank had laughed. It filled him with conflicting thoughts and feelings. He remembered the years in uniform, when they came up through the ranks together, how when Ed was made detective, how he brought Frank along and vouched for him. He had mentored the man out of friendship, made him his partner. When Ed made sergeant he kept Frank with him, covering for his mistakes, thinking of his wife's family, who would hold it over him forever if he didn't succeed.
Frank had married up, Edna's folks were not stinking rich, as it were, but they were well off. If they hadn't been, Frank wouldn't have been able to afford that lovely house and new car. He pictured the new '54 Fairlane, Edna getting out of it with her short stole as Frank held the door. Edna was a fashion statement but all their friends knew that it was daddy's money, not Frank's. He had made detective, with Ed's help, but couldn't seem to advance further. Edna's family never let Frank forget that he was lucky to have her; he was, after all a mere Morton, not an Eldridge like them. Ed guessed the disdain of his family drove Frank to the arms of the easily impressed girl from the poor side of town.
Clara Miller was trailer trash of the first order. She was all curves and short-shorts, bursting out of her top and completely out of control. Old man Miller had no rein on her. She was a hopeless flirt.
Frank wouldn't have left his wife to marry Clara, no matter what. To leave his wife would be to leave the family money. Clara was young and pretty but still poor white trash and he was not about to leave the crest of the hill for the edge of the bog. There was little doubt that Frank had slipped off with the Miller girl, or that he was probably the one who killed her. Her hair and blood might still be on the butt of his pistol.
“He's probably telling them right now that his partner is dead, slipped beneath the swamp never to be seen again,” Ed thought. There might be a search, but Frank would convince them it would be fruitless. He would point them in a different direction.
Still, a search could happen. It was better to believe a search could be in the works than not. If they came this way, they'd find him and he would be saved. Of course, he'd have to arrest Frank at the earliest opportunity and take that gun away from him.
Martha Sawyer had locked up the police station and pushed her green Chevrolet station wagon as hard as she dared out the old dirt road to Thompson Bog, the muddy depression that was the only swamp land in Landon County. She had taken the strongest light she could find and her winter boots. She was not going to give up without a search. Ed Riggs was too good a man to just let die in the swamp; someone had to at least try to find him. She didn't notice that the car she passed on the two-lane blacktop was her boss; she only knew that the headlights were not fading away behind her fast enough. Whoever it was she had passed was now chasing her.
Martha reached into the glove box and took out the .38 revolver. If this was someone who was a danger, he would not find her a willing victim.
The lights picked up behind her and Martha stepped harder on the gas, nearly going off the road at Turner's Trace. The wheels hit dirt and spun as a flume of dirt and mud flew up behind the wagon. Back on pavement again, the wagon shot forward with a jerk, then lurched as she spun the wheel, pulling onto Old New Hope Church Road and down toward the wetlands where the Miller trailer stood.
At the wide spot in the road, the broken-down trailer and the ratty remains of a small pier were the only sign that man had ever put a foot here. The clouds hid the moon and stars, leaving only a few remaining lightning bugs to give any natural light.
Martha pulled the car up, spraying the cat tails with light. Small animals scurried for cover as Martha got out of the car and turned on her flashlight. She started toward the pier.
Behind her a second pair of headlights pulled up and the chief's Chrysler came to a stop next to the station wagon. Martha turned ready for battle, then stopped and lowered her pistol when she saw it was Chief McLean.
“Martha, what the hell are you up to?” yelled McLean.
“Chief, don't come up on me like that, I nearly shot you for a poacher.”
“Well, who did you expect? Why aren't you at the office or home? What are you up to out here at this hour?”
“You haven't heard? The swamp took Ed Riggs. He was out here looking for the Miller girl with Frank and fell in. Frank came back saying he was a goner for sure but wasn't going to look for him. I just figured I wasn't going to let it go at that; someone's go to at least try, for Pete's sake!”
“Ed gone? When did this happen?”
“Within the hour. I left as soon as Frank was gone.”
“So where's Frank? Is he out here?” said the chief, looking around, half expecting to see his only remaining detective.
“No,” said Martha, sharply. “He went home to get a good rest so he can start fresh in the morning, he said. He's already moved into Ed's desk. I'm out here alone.”
“And with a gun, I see.” said the chief, looking at Martha's pistol. “Is that standard issue?”
“I'm not coming out here unarmed. You can site me in the morning, but tonight, I'm going looking for Ed Riggs and not coming home without him or his body.” Martha turned sharply and began walking toward the pier.
“Wait up a minute,” said McLean. He went to his trunk, opened it and came out with a flashlight and a pump-action shotgun. “As long as you're going to do something crazy, you may as well have company.”
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 3
Harlen Eldridge sat on the front porch of his lavish estate smoking a cigar. That the cigar was expensive didn't matter to his wife; she would not let him smoke it in the house. “Just as well,” he thought, “I've got things to do that are best done in the dark.”
The senior Eldridge thought about his darling daughter, Edna Maye, and unwrapped the string from the folder that sat on his lap. On the table close by sat a short glass of cut crystal with a heavy bottom and a dramatic pattern. He dropped two cubes of ice into the glass, covering them with whiskey from a matching decanter and adding a splash of water from a matching water pitcher. The folder had a stamp on the front, “A. Gaither Detective Agency.” Inside were typed reports and several black-and-white glossies taken from a distance.
The photos were of a man in a two-year-old black Ford sedan driving up to a trailer, the man walking up to the trailer and the man leaving the trailer after dark, kissing the girl in the glow of the yellow light coming through the door.
Harlen closed the folder. He would have to take action, but what? He could have the man fired from the force. But then he would just have to provide his out-of-work son-in-law with a job. He could expose him and get them divorced. But that would have his daughter back in the house and it had cost him a small fortune to have her married off; not many were willing to put up with his darling daughter. He could buy the Miller girl off easily enough, but there would be another in the next trailer down the road. Another thought flitted through his head, making him smile, but he soon shook it off.
“No. He is, after all, a detective of police, his disappearance is bound to bring up questions. That'll never do.” Harlen went back to his drink.
Al Gaither sat up with the ringing of the alarm clock. He slapped a large, flat hand on the button and the ringing stopped. He looked around. He was in his apartment on the outskirts of Landon County. “Thank God!” he said, turning to sit sideways on the bed. “Not another crumby motel room. It's good to be home if only for a while.”
It was midnight and he had to be going, there were people to follow, pictures to take, reports to make. Tonight, he would get to his hiding spot just in time to see his latest case leaving his girlfriend's place, kissing under the bare light bulb. It was all so romantic. Al smiled.
“You going already, babe?” said his wife, Claire.
“Yeah, gotta get the latest chapter of a story that is fast coming to a close. I'll be back in a couple of hours. We can have breakfast together later.”
Claire Gaither smiled and touched her husband's back as he got up to put on his shirt. She had married him when she was his secretary and he was just starting the agency. He had been a cop until a scandal had sullied him. He swore to the authorities and to her that he had been innocent. The charges were dropped for lack of evidence, but he had lost the trust of his superiors and took early retirement. She was much younger, but had no prospects and she respected him, so when he asked, she answered to the affirmative. Al knew he was lucky to have her and showed it whenever he could. Every night that he spent watching others cheat on their wives made him happier to see her when he got home.
Al got dressed in the same clothes he had on earlier that day when he took the folder out to the Eldridge place. “See what else you can get.” old man Eldridge had said. “You're the boss.” Al had replied. Now he was once again getting into the aging Chevy and backing down the driveway in the middle of the night.
Collin Miller sat in his boat, his shotgun across his lap and a lantern on the front board, drinking kerosene. Well, it tasted like kerosene, anyway. Whatever it was the Belter boys were making up there, it had a kick and got him numb and that's all he cared about. They took his $2.00 and gave him a couple of Mason jars of it. He was already into the second.
A sound to the right caused him to turn the flashlight on and look over, but he couldn't see what it was. “It sure ain't Clara,” he said to himself. He turned the flashlight off, content to sit by the dim light of the lantern.
He had named his daughter after his wife. Mrs. Miller had died in childbirth. To help raise Clara, he had remarried quickly, but she left before too long. Living with Collin Miller proved to be a chore not worth the trouble. A third woman stayed a while, then left when the subject of marriage came up; he was still married to the missing second Mrs. Miller. After that, a string of increasingly desperate single women came and went from his life until finally there was only him and young Clara.
But Clara was growing into a woman and her womanhood was firing on all cylinders. Keeping the boys away was a full-time job and more than once the dogs had given chase through the woods followed by a blast from Miller's shot gun. The police had come out twice to remind him that murder is a crime, teenage daughter or no teenage daughter.
It wasn't until his shift was changed to grave-yard that she stopped taunting the local young studs. Collin thought it might be she was finally growing up, but coming home early to find a grown man leaving the trailer changed his way of thinking. He had passed the man on the road. A black Ford sedan with a grown man at the wheel, in a tie and a hat and coming from his trailer. “Who was that?” he had asked Clara, but she just swore up and down that no one had been there. That's when he knew that the man who had been there was there for her and not for some other business. He had recently demanded another shift and had been laid off for his trouble.
Now he sat and waited for the man to come back. Instead of the man coming back, Clara was gone. When he came home that night, there was no sign of her. The police had come out and asked some questions, but they didn't seem very interested. The police had the same kind of black sedan as the man, but then next to Collin's old truck, they all looked alike.
He pictured the black Ford sedan, riding down the road, the man laughing, Clara in the passenger seat, laughing right along with him, and figured he was better to be shut of her. Still, he hadn't come up like a man and asked for her, he just took her – and nobody took anything from Collin Miller and got away with it. If the police found him, he would go to jail, but if Collin found him first, the man would be picking buck shot out of his butt-cheeks until the next winter. Miller took another drink of the second jar of the Belter brothers' home-made and listened for the sound of someone who might be coming through the swamp to steal from him.
Harlen Eldridge sat on the front porch of his lavish estate smoking a cigar. That the cigar was expensive didn't matter to his wife; she would not let him smoke it in the house. “Just as well,” he thought, “I've got things to do that are best done in the dark.”
The senior Eldridge thought about his darling daughter, Edna Maye, and unwrapped the string from the folder that sat on his lap. On the table close by sat a short glass of cut crystal with a heavy bottom and a dramatic pattern. He dropped two cubes of ice into the glass, covering them with whiskey from a matching decanter and adding a splash of water from a matching water pitcher. The folder had a stamp on the front, “A. Gaither Detective Agency.” Inside were typed reports and several black-and-white glossies taken from a distance.
The photos were of a man in a two-year-old black Ford sedan driving up to a trailer, the man walking up to the trailer and the man leaving the trailer after dark, kissing the girl in the glow of the yellow light coming through the door.
Harlen closed the folder. He would have to take action, but what? He could have the man fired from the force. But then he would just have to provide his out-of-work son-in-law with a job. He could expose him and get them divorced. But that would have his daughter back in the house and it had cost him a small fortune to have her married off; not many were willing to put up with his darling daughter. He could buy the Miller girl off easily enough, but there would be another in the next trailer down the road. Another thought flitted through his head, making him smile, but he soon shook it off.
“No. He is, after all, a detective of police, his disappearance is bound to bring up questions. That'll never do.” Harlen went back to his drink.
Al Gaither sat up with the ringing of the alarm clock. He slapped a large, flat hand on the button and the ringing stopped. He looked around. He was in his apartment on the outskirts of Landon County. “Thank God!” he said, turning to sit sideways on the bed. “Not another crumby motel room. It's good to be home if only for a while.”
It was midnight and he had to be going, there were people to follow, pictures to take, reports to make. Tonight, he would get to his hiding spot just in time to see his latest case leaving his girlfriend's place, kissing under the bare light bulb. It was all so romantic. Al smiled.
“You going already, babe?” said his wife, Claire.
“Yeah, gotta get the latest chapter of a story that is fast coming to a close. I'll be back in a couple of hours. We can have breakfast together later.”
Claire Gaither smiled and touched her husband's back as he got up to put on his shirt. She had married him when she was his secretary and he was just starting the agency. He had been a cop until a scandal had sullied him. He swore to the authorities and to her that he had been innocent. The charges were dropped for lack of evidence, but he had lost the trust of his superiors and took early retirement. She was much younger, but had no prospects and she respected him, so when he asked, she answered to the affirmative. Al knew he was lucky to have her and showed it whenever he could. Every night that he spent watching others cheat on their wives made him happier to see her when he got home.
Al got dressed in the same clothes he had on earlier that day when he took the folder out to the Eldridge place. “See what else you can get.” old man Eldridge had said. “You're the boss.” Al had replied. Now he was once again getting into the aging Chevy and backing down the driveway in the middle of the night.
Collin Miller sat in his boat, his shotgun across his lap and a lantern on the front board, drinking kerosene. Well, it tasted like kerosene, anyway. Whatever it was the Belter boys were making up there, it had a kick and got him numb and that's all he cared about. They took his $2.00 and gave him a couple of Mason jars of it. He was already into the second.
A sound to the right caused him to turn the flashlight on and look over, but he couldn't see what it was. “It sure ain't Clara,” he said to himself. He turned the flashlight off, content to sit by the dim light of the lantern.
He had named his daughter after his wife. Mrs. Miller had died in childbirth. To help raise Clara, he had remarried quickly, but she left before too long. Living with Collin Miller proved to be a chore not worth the trouble. A third woman stayed a while, then left when the subject of marriage came up; he was still married to the missing second Mrs. Miller. After that, a string of increasingly desperate single women came and went from his life until finally there was only him and young Clara.
But Clara was growing into a woman and her womanhood was firing on all cylinders. Keeping the boys away was a full-time job and more than once the dogs had given chase through the woods followed by a blast from Miller's shot gun. The police had come out twice to remind him that murder is a crime, teenage daughter or no teenage daughter.
It wasn't until his shift was changed to grave-yard that she stopped taunting the local young studs. Collin thought it might be she was finally growing up, but coming home early to find a grown man leaving the trailer changed his way of thinking. He had passed the man on the road. A black Ford sedan with a grown man at the wheel, in a tie and a hat and coming from his trailer. “Who was that?” he had asked Clara, but she just swore up and down that no one had been there. That's when he knew that the man who had been there was there for her and not for some other business. He had recently demanded another shift and had been laid off for his trouble.
Now he sat and waited for the man to come back. Instead of the man coming back, Clara was gone. When he came home that night, there was no sign of her. The police had come out and asked some questions, but they didn't seem very interested. The police had the same kind of black sedan as the man, but then next to Collin's old truck, they all looked alike.
He pictured the black Ford sedan, riding down the road, the man laughing, Clara in the passenger seat, laughing right along with him, and figured he was better to be shut of her. Still, he hadn't come up like a man and asked for her, he just took her – and nobody took anything from Collin Miller and got away with it. If the police found him, he would go to jail, but if Collin found him first, the man would be picking buck shot out of his butt-cheeks until the next winter. Miller took another drink of the second jar of the Belter brothers' home-made and listened for the sound of someone who might be coming through the swamp to steal from him.
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 3
Harlen Eldridge sat on the front porch of his lavish estate smoking a cigar. That the cigar was expensive didn't matter to his wife; she would not let him smoke it in the house. “Just as well,” he thought, “I've got things to do that are best done in the dark.”
The senior Eldridge thought about his darling daughter, Edna Maye, and unwrapped the string from the folder that sat on his lap. On the table close by sat a short glass of cut crystal with a heavy bottom and a dramatic pattern. He dropped two cubes of ice into the glass, covering them with whiskey from a matching decanter and adding a splash of water from a matching water pitcher. The folder had a stamp on the front, “A. Gaither Detective Agency.” Inside were typed reports and several black-and-white glossies taken from a distance.
The photos were of a man in a two-year-old black Ford sedan driving up to a trailer, the man walking up to the trailer and the man leaving the trailer after dark, kissing the girl in the glow of the yellow light coming through the door.
Harlen closed the folder. He would have to take action, but what? He could have the man fired from the force. But then he would just have to provide his out-of-work son-in-law with a job. He could expose him and get them divorced. But that would have his daughter back in the house and it had cost him a small fortune to have her married off; not many were willing to put up with his darling daughter. He could buy the Miller girl off easily enough, but there would be another in the next trailer down the road. Another thought flitted through his head, making him smile, but he soon shook it off.
“No. He is, after all, a detective of police, his disappearance is bound to bring up questions. That'll never do.” Harlen went back to his drink.
Al Gaither sat up with the ringing of the alarm clock. He slapped a large, flat hand on the button and the ringing stopped. He looked around. He was in his apartment on the outskirts of Landon County. “Thank God!” he said, turning to sit sideways on the bed. “Not another crumby motel room. It's good to be home if only for a while.”
It was midnight and he had to be going, there were people to follow, pictures to take, reports to make. Tonight, he would get to his hiding spot just in time to see his latest case leaving his girlfriend's place, kissing under the bare light bulb. It was all so romantic. Al smiled.
“You going already, babe?” said his wife, Claire.
“Yeah, gotta get the latest chapter of a story that is fast coming to a close. I'll be back in a couple of hours. We can have breakfast together later.”
Claire Gaither smiled and touched her husband's back as he got up to put on his shirt. She had married him when she was his secretary and he was just starting the agency. He had been a cop until a scandal had sullied him. He swore to the authorities and to her that he had been innocent. The charges were dropped for lack of evidence, but he had lost the trust of his superiors and took early retirement. She was much younger, but had no prospects and she respected him, so when he asked, she answered to the affirmative. Al knew he was lucky to have her and showed it whenever he could. Every night that he spent watching others cheat on their wives made him happier to see her when he got home.
Al got dressed in the same clothes he had on earlier that day when he took the folder out to the Eldridge place. “See what else you can get.” old man Eldridge had said. “You're the boss.” Al had replied. Now he was once again getting into the aging Chevy and backing down the driveway in the middle of the night.
Collin Miller sat in his boat, his shotgun across his lap and a lantern on the front board, drinking kerosene. Well, it tasted like kerosene, anyway. Whatever it was the Belter boys were making up there, it had a kick and got him numb and that's all he cared about. They took his $2.00 and gave him a couple of Mason jars of it. He was already into the second.
A sound to the right caused him to turn the flashlight on and look over, but he couldn't see what it was. “It sure ain't Clara,” he said to himself. He turned the flashlight off, content to sit by the dim light of the lantern.
He had named his daughter after his wife. Mrs. Miller had died in childbirth. To help raise Clara, he had remarried quickly, but she left before too long. Living with Collin Miller proved to be a chore not worth the trouble. A third woman stayed a while, then left when the subject of marriage came up; he was still married to the missing second Mrs. Miller. After that, a string of increasingly desperate single women came and went from his life until finally there was only him and young Clara.
But Clara was growing into a woman and her womanhood was firing on all cylinders. Keeping the boys away was a full-time job and more than once the dogs had given chase through the woods followed by a blast from Miller's shot gun. The police had come out twice to remind him that murder is a crime, teenage daughter or no teenage daughter.
It wasn't until his shift was changed to grave-yard that she stopped taunting the local young studs. Collin thought it might be she was finally growing up, but coming home early to find a grown man leaving the trailer changed his way of thinking. He had passed the man on the road. A black Ford sedan with a grown man at the wheel, in a tie and a hat and coming from his trailer. “Who was that?” he had asked Clara, but she just swore up and down that no one had been there. That's when he knew that the man who had been there was there for her and not for some other business. He had recently demanded another shift and had been laid off for his trouble.
Now he sat and waited for the man to come back. Instead of the man coming back, Clara was gone. When he came home that night, there was no sign of her. The police had come out and asked some questions, but they didn't seem very interested. The police had the same kind of black sedan as the man, but then next to Collin's old truck, they all looked alike.
He pictured the black Ford sedan, riding down the road, the man laughing, Clara in the passenger seat, laughing right along with him, and figured he was better to be shut of her. Still, he hadn't come up like a man and asked for her, he just took her – and nobody took anything from Collin Miller and got away with it. If the police found him, he would go to jail, but if Collin found him first, the man would be picking buck shot out of his butt-cheeks until the next winter. Miller took another drink of the second jar of the Belter brothers' home-made and listened for the sound of someone who might be coming through the swamp to steal from him.
Harlen Eldridge sat on the front porch of his lavish estate smoking a cigar. That the cigar was expensive didn't matter to his wife; she would not let him smoke it in the house. “Just as well,” he thought, “I've got things to do that are best done in the dark.”
The senior Eldridge thought about his darling daughter, Edna Maye, and unwrapped the string from the folder that sat on his lap. On the table close by sat a short glass of cut crystal with a heavy bottom and a dramatic pattern. He dropped two cubes of ice into the glass, covering them with whiskey from a matching decanter and adding a splash of water from a matching water pitcher. The folder had a stamp on the front, “A. Gaither Detective Agency.” Inside were typed reports and several black-and-white glossies taken from a distance.
The photos were of a man in a two-year-old black Ford sedan driving up to a trailer, the man walking up to the trailer and the man leaving the trailer after dark, kissing the girl in the glow of the yellow light coming through the door.
Harlen closed the folder. He would have to take action, but what? He could have the man fired from the force. But then he would just have to provide his out-of-work son-in-law with a job. He could expose him and get them divorced. But that would have his daughter back in the house and it had cost him a small fortune to have her married off; not many were willing to put up with his darling daughter. He could buy the Miller girl off easily enough, but there would be another in the next trailer down the road. Another thought flitted through his head, making him smile, but he soon shook it off.
“No. He is, after all, a detective of police, his disappearance is bound to bring up questions. That'll never do.” Harlen went back to his drink.
Al Gaither sat up with the ringing of the alarm clock. He slapped a large, flat hand on the button and the ringing stopped. He looked around. He was in his apartment on the outskirts of Landon County. “Thank God!” he said, turning to sit sideways on the bed. “Not another crumby motel room. It's good to be home if only for a while.”
It was midnight and he had to be going, there were people to follow, pictures to take, reports to make. Tonight, he would get to his hiding spot just in time to see his latest case leaving his girlfriend's place, kissing under the bare light bulb. It was all so romantic. Al smiled.
“You going already, babe?” said his wife, Claire.
“Yeah, gotta get the latest chapter of a story that is fast coming to a close. I'll be back in a couple of hours. We can have breakfast together later.”
Claire Gaither smiled and touched her husband's back as he got up to put on his shirt. She had married him when she was his secretary and he was just starting the agency. He had been a cop until a scandal had sullied him. He swore to the authorities and to her that he had been innocent. The charges were dropped for lack of evidence, but he had lost the trust of his superiors and took early retirement. She was much younger, but had no prospects and she respected him, so when he asked, she answered to the affirmative. Al knew he was lucky to have her and showed it whenever he could. Every night that he spent watching others cheat on their wives made him happier to see her when he got home.
Al got dressed in the same clothes he had on earlier that day when he took the folder out to the Eldridge place. “See what else you can get.” old man Eldridge had said. “You're the boss.” Al had replied. Now he was once again getting into the aging Chevy and backing down the driveway in the middle of the night.
Collin Miller sat in his boat, his shotgun across his lap and a lantern on the front board, drinking kerosene. Well, it tasted like kerosene, anyway. Whatever it was the Belter boys were making up there, it had a kick and got him numb and that's all he cared about. They took his $2.00 and gave him a couple of Mason jars of it. He was already into the second.
A sound to the right caused him to turn the flashlight on and look over, but he couldn't see what it was. “It sure ain't Clara,” he said to himself. He turned the flashlight off, content to sit by the dim light of the lantern.
He had named his daughter after his wife. Mrs. Miller had died in childbirth. To help raise Clara, he had remarried quickly, but she left before too long. Living with Collin Miller proved to be a chore not worth the trouble. A third woman stayed a while, then left when the subject of marriage came up; he was still married to the missing second Mrs. Miller. After that, a string of increasingly desperate single women came and went from his life until finally there was only him and young Clara.
But Clara was growing into a woman and her womanhood was firing on all cylinders. Keeping the boys away was a full-time job and more than once the dogs had given chase through the woods followed by a blast from Miller's shot gun. The police had come out twice to remind him that murder is a crime, teenage daughter or no teenage daughter.
It wasn't until his shift was changed to grave-yard that she stopped taunting the local young studs. Collin thought it might be she was finally growing up, but coming home early to find a grown man leaving the trailer changed his way of thinking. He had passed the man on the road. A black Ford sedan with a grown man at the wheel, in a tie and a hat and coming from his trailer. “Who was that?” he had asked Clara, but she just swore up and down that no one had been there. That's when he knew that the man who had been there was there for her and not for some other business. He had recently demanded another shift and had been laid off for his trouble.
Now he sat and waited for the man to come back. Instead of the man coming back, Clara was gone. When he came home that night, there was no sign of her. The police had come out and asked some questions, but they didn't seem very interested. The police had the same kind of black sedan as the man, but then next to Collin's old truck, they all looked alike.
He pictured the black Ford sedan, riding down the road, the man laughing, Clara in the passenger seat, laughing right along with him, and figured he was better to be shut of her. Still, he hadn't come up like a man and asked for her, he just took her – and nobody took anything from Collin Miller and got away with it. If the police found him, he would go to jail, but if Collin found him first, the man would be picking buck shot out of his butt-cheeks until the next winter. Miller took another drink of the second jar of the Belter brothers' home-made and listened for the sound of someone who might be coming through the swamp to steal from him.
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 3
Harlen Eldridge sat on the front porch of his lavish estate smoking a cigar. That the cigar was expensive didn't matter to his wife; she would not let him smoke it in the house. “Just as well,” he thought, “I've got things to do that are best done in the dark.”
The senior Eldridge thought about his darling daughter, Edna Maye, and unwrapped the string from the folder that sat on his lap. On the table close by sat a short glass of cut crystal with a heavy bottom and a dramatic pattern. He dropped two cubes of ice into the glass, covering them with whiskey from a matching decanter and adding a splash of water from a matching water pitcher. The folder had a stamp on the front, “A. Gaither Detective Agency.” Inside were typed reports and several black-and-white glossies taken from a distance.
The photos were of a man in a two-year-old black Ford sedan driving up to a trailer, the man walking up to the trailer and the man leaving the trailer after dark, kissing the girl in the glow of the yellow light coming through the door.
Harlen closed the folder. He would have to take action, but what? He could have the man fired from the force. But then he would just have to provide his out-of-work son-in-law with a job. He could expose him and get them divorced. But that would have his daughter back in the house and it had cost him a small fortune to have her married off; not many were willing to put up with his darling daughter. He could buy the Miller girl off easily enough, but there would be another in the next trailer down the road. Another thought flitted through his head, making him smile, but he soon shook it off.
“No. He is, after all, a detective of police, his disappearance is bound to bring up questions. That'll never do.” Harlen went back to his drink.
Al Gaither sat up with the ringing of the alarm clock. He slapped a large, flat hand on the button and the ringing stopped. He looked around. He was in his apartment on the outskirts of Landon County. “Thank God!” he said, turning to sit sideways on the bed. “Not another crumby motel room. It's good to be home if only for a while.”
It was midnight and he had to be going, there were people to follow, pictures to take, reports to make. Tonight, he would get to his hiding spot just in time to see his latest case leaving his girlfriend's place, kissing under the bare light bulb. It was all so romantic. Al smiled.
“You going already, babe?” said his wife, Claire.
“Yeah, gotta get the latest chapter of a story that is fast coming to a close. I'll be back in a couple of hours. We can have breakfast together later.”
Claire Gaither smiled and touched her husband's back as he got up to put on his shirt. She had married him when she was his secretary and he was just starting the agency. He had been a cop until a scandal had sullied him. He swore to the authorities and to her that he had been innocent. The charges were dropped for lack of evidence, but he had lost the trust of his superiors and took early retirement. She was much younger, but had no prospects and she respected him, so when he asked, she answered to the affirmative. Al knew he was lucky to have her and showed it whenever he could. Every night that he spent watching others cheat on their wives made him happier to see her when he got home.
Al got dressed in the same clothes he had on earlier that day when he took the folder out to the Eldridge place. “See what else you can get.” old man Eldridge had said. “You're the boss.” Al had replied. Now he was once again getting into the aging Chevy and backing down the driveway in the middle of the night.
Collin Miller sat in his boat, his shotgun across his lap and a lantern on the front board, drinking kerosene. Well, it tasted like kerosene, anyway. Whatever it was the Belter boys were making up there, it had a kick and got him numb and that's all he cared about. They took his $2.00 and gave him a couple of Mason jars of it. He was already into the second.
A sound to the right caused him to turn the flashlight on and look over, but he couldn't see what it was. “It sure ain't Clara,” he said to himself. He turned the flashlight off, content to sit by the dim light of the lantern.
He had named his daughter after his wife. Mrs. Miller had died in childbirth. To help raise Clara, he had remarried quickly, but she left before too long. Living with Collin Miller proved to be a chore not worth the trouble. A third woman stayed a while, then left when the subject of marriage came up; he was still married to the missing second Mrs. Miller. After that, a string of increasingly desperate single women came and went from his life until finally there was only him and young Clara.
But Clara was growing into a woman and her womanhood was firing on all cylinders. Keeping the boys away was a full-time job and more than once the dogs had given chase through the woods followed by a blast from Miller's shot gun. The police had come out twice to remind him that murder is a crime, teenage daughter or no teenage daughter.
It wasn't until his shift was changed to grave-yard that she stopped taunting the local young studs. Collin thought it might be she was finally growing up, but coming home early to find a grown man leaving the trailer changed his way of thinking. He had passed the man on the road. A black Ford sedan with a grown man at the wheel, in a tie and a hat and coming from his trailer. “Who was that?” he had asked Clara, but she just swore up and down that no one had been there. That's when he knew that the man who had been there was there for her and not for some other business. He had recently demanded another shift and had been laid off for his trouble.
Now he sat and waited for the man to come back. Instead of the man coming back, Clara was gone. When he came home that night, there was no sign of her. The police had come out and asked some questions, but they didn't seem very interested. The police had the same kind of black sedan as the man, but then next to Collin's old truck, they all looked alike.
He pictured the black Ford sedan, riding down the road, the man laughing, Clara in the passenger seat, laughing right along with him, and figured he was better to be shut of her. Still, he hadn't come up like a man and asked for her, he just took her – and nobody took anything from Collin Miller and got away with it. If the police found him, he would go to jail, but if Collin found him first, the man would be picking buck shot out of his butt-cheeks until the next winter. Miller took another drink of the second jar of the Belter brothers' home-made and listened for the sound of someone who might be coming through the swamp to steal from him.
Harlen Eldridge sat on the front porch of his lavish estate smoking a cigar. That the cigar was expensive didn't matter to his wife; she would not let him smoke it in the house. “Just as well,” he thought, “I've got things to do that are best done in the dark.”
The senior Eldridge thought about his darling daughter, Edna Maye, and unwrapped the string from the folder that sat on his lap. On the table close by sat a short glass of cut crystal with a heavy bottom and a dramatic pattern. He dropped two cubes of ice into the glass, covering them with whiskey from a matching decanter and adding a splash of water from a matching water pitcher. The folder had a stamp on the front, “A. Gaither Detective Agency.” Inside were typed reports and several black-and-white glossies taken from a distance.
The photos were of a man in a two-year-old black Ford sedan driving up to a trailer, the man walking up to the trailer and the man leaving the trailer after dark, kissing the girl in the glow of the yellow light coming through the door.
Harlen closed the folder. He would have to take action, but what? He could have the man fired from the force. But then he would just have to provide his out-of-work son-in-law with a job. He could expose him and get them divorced. But that would have his daughter back in the house and it had cost him a small fortune to have her married off; not many were willing to put up with his darling daughter. He could buy the Miller girl off easily enough, but there would be another in the next trailer down the road. Another thought flitted through his head, making him smile, but he soon shook it off.
“No. He is, after all, a detective of police, his disappearance is bound to bring up questions. That'll never do.” Harlen went back to his drink.
Al Gaither sat up with the ringing of the alarm clock. He slapped a large, flat hand on the button and the ringing stopped. He looked around. He was in his apartment on the outskirts of Landon County. “Thank God!” he said, turning to sit sideways on the bed. “Not another crumby motel room. It's good to be home if only for a while.”
It was midnight and he had to be going, there were people to follow, pictures to take, reports to make. Tonight, he would get to his hiding spot just in time to see his latest case leaving his girlfriend's place, kissing under the bare light bulb. It was all so romantic. Al smiled.
“You going already, babe?” said his wife, Claire.
“Yeah, gotta get the latest chapter of a story that is fast coming to a close. I'll be back in a couple of hours. We can have breakfast together later.”
Claire Gaither smiled and touched her husband's back as he got up to put on his shirt. She had married him when she was his secretary and he was just starting the agency. He had been a cop until a scandal had sullied him. He swore to the authorities and to her that he had been innocent. The charges were dropped for lack of evidence, but he had lost the trust of his superiors and took early retirement. She was much younger, but had no prospects and she respected him, so when he asked, she answered to the affirmative. Al knew he was lucky to have her and showed it whenever he could. Every night that he spent watching others cheat on their wives made him happier to see her when he got home.
Al got dressed in the same clothes he had on earlier that day when he took the folder out to the Eldridge place. “See what else you can get.” old man Eldridge had said. “You're the boss.” Al had replied. Now he was once again getting into the aging Chevy and backing down the driveway in the middle of the night.
Collin Miller sat in his boat, his shotgun across his lap and a lantern on the front board, drinking kerosene. Well, it tasted like kerosene, anyway. Whatever it was the Belter boys were making up there, it had a kick and got him numb and that's all he cared about. They took his $2.00 and gave him a couple of Mason jars of it. He was already into the second.
A sound to the right caused him to turn the flashlight on and look over, but he couldn't see what it was. “It sure ain't Clara,” he said to himself. He turned the flashlight off, content to sit by the dim light of the lantern.
He had named his daughter after his wife. Mrs. Miller had died in childbirth. To help raise Clara, he had remarried quickly, but she left before too long. Living with Collin Miller proved to be a chore not worth the trouble. A third woman stayed a while, then left when the subject of marriage came up; he was still married to the missing second Mrs. Miller. After that, a string of increasingly desperate single women came and went from his life until finally there was only him and young Clara.
But Clara was growing into a woman and her womanhood was firing on all cylinders. Keeping the boys away was a full-time job and more than once the dogs had given chase through the woods followed by a blast from Miller's shot gun. The police had come out twice to remind him that murder is a crime, teenage daughter or no teenage daughter.
It wasn't until his shift was changed to grave-yard that she stopped taunting the local young studs. Collin thought it might be she was finally growing up, but coming home early to find a grown man leaving the trailer changed his way of thinking. He had passed the man on the road. A black Ford sedan with a grown man at the wheel, in a tie and a hat and coming from his trailer. “Who was that?” he had asked Clara, but she just swore up and down that no one had been there. That's when he knew that the man who had been there was there for her and not for some other business. He had recently demanded another shift and had been laid off for his trouble.
Now he sat and waited for the man to come back. Instead of the man coming back, Clara was gone. When he came home that night, there was no sign of her. The police had come out and asked some questions, but they didn't seem very interested. The police had the same kind of black sedan as the man, but then next to Collin's old truck, they all looked alike.
He pictured the black Ford sedan, riding down the road, the man laughing, Clara in the passenger seat, laughing right along with him, and figured he was better to be shut of her. Still, he hadn't come up like a man and asked for her, he just took her – and nobody took anything from Collin Miller and got away with it. If the police found him, he would go to jail, but if Collin found him first, the man would be picking buck shot out of his butt-cheeks until the next winter. Miller took another drink of the second jar of the Belter brothers' home-made and listened for the sound of someone who might be coming through the swamp to steal from him.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 2
Beneath the dark, slimy water, Ed Riggs struggled to free himself of the bog's grasp. He was pulled down by his own weight, by his own weakness, by his age. He was no longer a young man, like Frank Morton, thin and strong. No, he was overweight and over the hill. Perhaps it was fitting that he die this way, Ed thought, it would be a good lesson that one should keep in shape.
He was held down by his overcoat, by his suit jacket, by his gun that caught on the twining roots of the Cypress and kept him from escaping to the air above. He kicked his feet, but his pants seemed to fight against his legs and his shoes stuck in the muddy bottom.
A million thoughts raced through the Detective Sergeant's mind: “Damn Frank Morton! I made him! This can't be how it ends for me! I have to find a way out! There's so many things I still have to do!”
Lifting his leg through great effort, he felt his shoe come off. His leg brushed something sharp and the pain shot through his calf. He put his leg down hoping to gain some leverage. His lungs felt like they would burst.
He touched something solid with his foot, kicked against it and felt his overcoat slip away. He thought he was rising toward the surface, freed of the overcoat. He kicked with his feet a second time. He felt a tearing at his belt and kicked again.
“Air! Air!” screamed the voice inside his head as he broke through the surface and spat out a mouth full of gunk, gasping for enough air to keep a grip on life.
Ed Riggs held on to a Cypress root, chest deep in Thompson Bog, struggling for his breath. Through the Cypress roots, across the muddy Miller yard, tail lights were disappearing down the dirt road.
“It's black as pitch out there,” said Detective Frank Morton. “All I saw by the glow of his flashlight was his hand sinking below the mud. I'm afraid he's gone.”
“We should call in the uniformed officers, maybe get out the Fire Department and some of the fellas and go search for him, maybe there's still hope.”
Martha Sawyer was pale and shaking. The station had been her first job out of school and after 13 years she could not see herself working anywhere else. Ed was a fixture there; she admired him. What would it be like without him? What would they do without him? What would she do?
“Martha, I'm tellin' ya, it ain't no use. The man's gone,” Frank yelled. “He's slipped into that bog out there and there's no way to find him and if we do, he can't breathe under mud and water. He's dead. The best we can hope for is to pull his body out when it gets light, if we can find it.”
Martha sank with despair. She looked sadly at Ed's desk, the Miller file still open. Who would solve that case now? What did it matter when Landon County's best detective was dead in the attempt?
Frank walked over to the desk, turned the file to him, then turned it back, sat down at Ed's desk and began to look at the file.
“I'll take up the case. I worked with him, I know how he operated. I can pick up where he left off.” Frank said, and began by taking over the larger desk of the dead detective.
“A little early to start dividing up his property, isn't it?” Martha said with narrowed eyes. “The man's not even pronounced and you are sitting in his chair. Why don't you show a little respect?”
Frank leaped from the chair, pulling his suit-coat around behind him, letting his gun holster show, “Because there's a murderer out there and I'm the only one left to stop him, that's why. Because I'm the detective and you're the damned secretary, that's why.”
Martha turned back to her desk. There was no arguing with him when he was like this. Only Ed could calm him and put him back on the track of rational thought, and Ed was not here. No, Ed was in Thompson Bog, suffocated to death. Martha shook with the thought, then hung her head and cried for Ed.
At Ed's desk, Frank thumbed through a short stack of folders. “Soon as it's light, I'll start again. But there's more here than just that missing girl to deal with. For a man who was so well thought of,” Frank said with a familiar attitude, “he had a lot of unsolved cases.”
Martha looked up with a new distaste for the man with no respect for his partner. Ed had reduced the stack of unsolved crimes from more than two hundred to an impressive twelve. The dozen that were left were dead ends that no one could figure out, but he hadn't stopped trying. Martha wanted to shout the man down, but knew that it would mean her job, the job that suddenly didn't seem all that desirable.
She began to formulate a response, one that would surely get her fired, but might also get her physically hurt. Frank could be mean and violent. She wanted to say something, but then Frank stood up.
“I'll get a fresh start in the morning,” Frank said. “I'll call the coroner and get him to pronounce on Ed and then we'll figure out what to do for a funeral. See you in the morning, Martha.”
Frank sauntered out a bit too jauntily for Martha's taste, but there was no one to tell about it. She knew that the Landon County hierarchy was too busy with their own amusements to bother about her suspicions. To them it would be an open-and-shut case; a detective goes out to investigate a missing girl, falls into the swamp and gets pulled down. He drowns and his partner takes over the case. It was the natural order of things, so why bother them about it?
Martha sighed heavily and looked at her desk. The papers that seemed so important minutes ago looked blank to her. There was nothing on them that had the least significance. Martha felt helpless and lost. Outside the station, the road was dark and empty; the night was still; the world had stopped turning.
“No sense in rushing this,” Ed Riggs thought as he began to take stock. There was a sharp pain in his left leg. There were other aches, but they were minor. He was breathing! He was alive! That was something! That was the main thing!
He pulled himself up out of the water enough to grab onto one of the large Cypress legs. He was able to hang on to the root system enough to keep him from sinking again into the murky water. The hollow beneath the tree smelled of musk and decaying leaves.
Something touched his right leg; something moving. Ed pulled his leg up sharply, still clinging to the giant roots. Whatever it was had wrapped itself around his right foot. He lifted his foot up and reached down with his hand, grabbed and pulled up. He half expected to find a snake, one he would have to beat to death with one hand while holding on to the root with the other. What he held was a rope.
Ed pulled on the rope and felt it give on the other end. There had to be another end entangled in something, but not the tree. Slowly, the rope gave out more length. What came up was hard to see in the darkness, but Ed's eyes were growing accustomed to the dark. Two eyes, open and lifeless, looked at nothing. The mouth hung limp. It was the Miller girl.
Edna Eldridge Morton sat in front of the television, glancing out of the window of her ranch style home as the lights of the black Ford pulled into the drive. She sighed, putting out her cigarette. She hated being alone, but now that Frank was home, she hated even more being alone with him. The shine had worn off her marriage; the thrill she had felt when she married a policeman was gone.
“You're home early,” she said as Frank walked into the door, “it's not after midnight yet.”
Frank stopped, sneering at the woman he had been so proud to call his wife a few years before, who now openly berated him at every opportunity. “It's too dark to do anything tonight.” Frank took off is hat and coat, hanging the coat on the end of the hall closet door to dry.
“I thought you did your best work in the dark.” Edna took another cigarette from the pack of Chesterfields and lit it with a small, gold lighter.
Frank turned to regard her, wishing that it had been her that he had hit with the butt of his pistol and dragged into the swamp. He wished he could come home instead to the Miller girl from the trailer park and live here with her. She would appreciate him. She would like living in a nice house with a new car in the driveway and a new television set in the corner. She would meet him at the door with a cold beer and a warm kiss instead of a snide remark and a hateful stare.
“We lost Ed Riggs tonight; he got stuck in the swamp and went down.” Frank went to the sideboard and poured a whiskey into a heavy-bottomed glass.
“Ed? Lost in the swamp?” Edna seemed suddenly concerned. “Did you send in a search party? Have they given up already?”
“I saw him go under. He hit a quick place, it took him before I could get to him. No use searching, he's dead.” Frank drank down the whiskey, winced and poured another.
“What are you going to do now?” Edna had a vacant look, the blood had drained from her face.
“What do you mean, what am I going to do now? The same thing I have been doing, only maybe now I can make it to sergeant without him holding me back.”
Edna was up out of her chair now, her back to the television, ignoring the pop western that was boring her minutes earlier. “Ed Riggs was all that was keeping you in that job,” she flared. “With him gone you might just find yourself replaced with a hat rack. Does the chief know?”
“The chief has other things on his mind than the case we were working on.”
“A murdered girl?” she folder her arms, challenging him.
“A missing girl, there's no evidence she's been murdered. She probably ran off with some traveling salesman.” Frank finished another drink and turned around, reaching for the bottle.
“You think she'd do that, run off in the middle of the night?”
“Riggs said he found blood, but it could be the blood isn't human. There were drag marks, but it could be from some old washing machine she drug off into the bog to get rid of. Ed went looking and see where it got him.”
A thick silence hung in the air between them as she pondered the possibilities. With Ed Riggs gone, her husband had no protector at the station, no one to follow behind. He could be promoted, but then he would fall on his face and that would be an embarrassment. He might be demoted and that would be as bad or worse. He might quit or be fired, but then he would want her father to find him a job. Where would he put her inept husband where he couldn't do any damage?
“I'm going to take a bath and go to bed.” Edna turned and walked down the hall without shutting the television off.
On the screen, a gunfight was brewing outside the saloon. The good guy was clean and well groomed in a new shirt. The bad guy was dressed in black, dirty and with a scar. It was clear who would win. Frank wondered why people watched these things. Then he sat down, pulled a Chesterfield from the pack and lit it with Edna's gold lighter. He took a long, slow sip of his drink and watched as the good guy shot the gun out of the hand of the bad guy without drawing a drop of blood. “Pretty good,” he thought.
Beneath the dark, slimy water, Ed Riggs struggled to free himself of the bog's grasp. He was pulled down by his own weight, by his own weakness, by his age. He was no longer a young man, like Frank Morton, thin and strong. No, he was overweight and over the hill. Perhaps it was fitting that he die this way, Ed thought, it would be a good lesson that one should keep in shape.
He was held down by his overcoat, by his suit jacket, by his gun that caught on the twining roots of the Cypress and kept him from escaping to the air above. He kicked his feet, but his pants seemed to fight against his legs and his shoes stuck in the muddy bottom.
A million thoughts raced through the Detective Sergeant's mind: “Damn Frank Morton! I made him! This can't be how it ends for me! I have to find a way out! There's so many things I still have to do!”
Lifting his leg through great effort, he felt his shoe come off. His leg brushed something sharp and the pain shot through his calf. He put his leg down hoping to gain some leverage. His lungs felt like they would burst.
He touched something solid with his foot, kicked against it and felt his overcoat slip away. He thought he was rising toward the surface, freed of the overcoat. He kicked with his feet a second time. He felt a tearing at his belt and kicked again.
“Air! Air!” screamed the voice inside his head as he broke through the surface and spat out a mouth full of gunk, gasping for enough air to keep a grip on life.
Ed Riggs held on to a Cypress root, chest deep in Thompson Bog, struggling for his breath. Through the Cypress roots, across the muddy Miller yard, tail lights were disappearing down the dirt road.
“It's black as pitch out there,” said Detective Frank Morton. “All I saw by the glow of his flashlight was his hand sinking below the mud. I'm afraid he's gone.”
“We should call in the uniformed officers, maybe get out the Fire Department and some of the fellas and go search for him, maybe there's still hope.”
Martha Sawyer was pale and shaking. The station had been her first job out of school and after 13 years she could not see herself working anywhere else. Ed was a fixture there; she admired him. What would it be like without him? What would they do without him? What would she do?
“Martha, I'm tellin' ya, it ain't no use. The man's gone,” Frank yelled. “He's slipped into that bog out there and there's no way to find him and if we do, he can't breathe under mud and water. He's dead. The best we can hope for is to pull his body out when it gets light, if we can find it.”
Martha sank with despair. She looked sadly at Ed's desk, the Miller file still open. Who would solve that case now? What did it matter when Landon County's best detective was dead in the attempt?
Frank walked over to the desk, turned the file to him, then turned it back, sat down at Ed's desk and began to look at the file.
“I'll take up the case. I worked with him, I know how he operated. I can pick up where he left off.” Frank said, and began by taking over the larger desk of the dead detective.
“A little early to start dividing up his property, isn't it?” Martha said with narrowed eyes. “The man's not even pronounced and you are sitting in his chair. Why don't you show a little respect?”
Frank leaped from the chair, pulling his suit-coat around behind him, letting his gun holster show, “Because there's a murderer out there and I'm the only one left to stop him, that's why. Because I'm the detective and you're the damned secretary, that's why.”
Martha turned back to her desk. There was no arguing with him when he was like this. Only Ed could calm him and put him back on the track of rational thought, and Ed was not here. No, Ed was in Thompson Bog, suffocated to death. Martha shook with the thought, then hung her head and cried for Ed.
At Ed's desk, Frank thumbed through a short stack of folders. “Soon as it's light, I'll start again. But there's more here than just that missing girl to deal with. For a man who was so well thought of,” Frank said with a familiar attitude, “he had a lot of unsolved cases.”
Martha looked up with a new distaste for the man with no respect for his partner. Ed had reduced the stack of unsolved crimes from more than two hundred to an impressive twelve. The dozen that were left were dead ends that no one could figure out, but he hadn't stopped trying. Martha wanted to shout the man down, but knew that it would mean her job, the job that suddenly didn't seem all that desirable.
She began to formulate a response, one that would surely get her fired, but might also get her physically hurt. Frank could be mean and violent. She wanted to say something, but then Frank stood up.
“I'll get a fresh start in the morning,” Frank said. “I'll call the coroner and get him to pronounce on Ed and then we'll figure out what to do for a funeral. See you in the morning, Martha.”
Frank sauntered out a bit too jauntily for Martha's taste, but there was no one to tell about it. She knew that the Landon County hierarchy was too busy with their own amusements to bother about her suspicions. To them it would be an open-and-shut case; a detective goes out to investigate a missing girl, falls into the swamp and gets pulled down. He drowns and his partner takes over the case. It was the natural order of things, so why bother them about it?
Martha sighed heavily and looked at her desk. The papers that seemed so important minutes ago looked blank to her. There was nothing on them that had the least significance. Martha felt helpless and lost. Outside the station, the road was dark and empty; the night was still; the world had stopped turning.
“No sense in rushing this,” Ed Riggs thought as he began to take stock. There was a sharp pain in his left leg. There were other aches, but they were minor. He was breathing! He was alive! That was something! That was the main thing!
He pulled himself up out of the water enough to grab onto one of the large Cypress legs. He was able to hang on to the root system enough to keep him from sinking again into the murky water. The hollow beneath the tree smelled of musk and decaying leaves.
Something touched his right leg; something moving. Ed pulled his leg up sharply, still clinging to the giant roots. Whatever it was had wrapped itself around his right foot. He lifted his foot up and reached down with his hand, grabbed and pulled up. He half expected to find a snake, one he would have to beat to death with one hand while holding on to the root with the other. What he held was a rope.
Ed pulled on the rope and felt it give on the other end. There had to be another end entangled in something, but not the tree. Slowly, the rope gave out more length. What came up was hard to see in the darkness, but Ed's eyes were growing accustomed to the dark. Two eyes, open and lifeless, looked at nothing. The mouth hung limp. It was the Miller girl.
Edna Eldridge Morton sat in front of the television, glancing out of the window of her ranch style home as the lights of the black Ford pulled into the drive. She sighed, putting out her cigarette. She hated being alone, but now that Frank was home, she hated even more being alone with him. The shine had worn off her marriage; the thrill she had felt when she married a policeman was gone.
“You're home early,” she said as Frank walked into the door, “it's not after midnight yet.”
Frank stopped, sneering at the woman he had been so proud to call his wife a few years before, who now openly berated him at every opportunity. “It's too dark to do anything tonight.” Frank took off is hat and coat, hanging the coat on the end of the hall closet door to dry.
“I thought you did your best work in the dark.” Edna took another cigarette from the pack of Chesterfields and lit it with a small, gold lighter.
Frank turned to regard her, wishing that it had been her that he had hit with the butt of his pistol and dragged into the swamp. He wished he could come home instead to the Miller girl from the trailer park and live here with her. She would appreciate him. She would like living in a nice house with a new car in the driveway and a new television set in the corner. She would meet him at the door with a cold beer and a warm kiss instead of a snide remark and a hateful stare.
“We lost Ed Riggs tonight; he got stuck in the swamp and went down.” Frank went to the sideboard and poured a whiskey into a heavy-bottomed glass.
“Ed? Lost in the swamp?” Edna seemed suddenly concerned. “Did you send in a search party? Have they given up already?”
“I saw him go under. He hit a quick place, it took him before I could get to him. No use searching, he's dead.” Frank drank down the whiskey, winced and poured another.
“What are you going to do now?” Edna had a vacant look, the blood had drained from her face.
“What do you mean, what am I going to do now? The same thing I have been doing, only maybe now I can make it to sergeant without him holding me back.”
Edna was up out of her chair now, her back to the television, ignoring the pop western that was boring her minutes earlier. “Ed Riggs was all that was keeping you in that job,” she flared. “With him gone you might just find yourself replaced with a hat rack. Does the chief know?”
“The chief has other things on his mind than the case we were working on.”
“A murdered girl?” she folder her arms, challenging him.
“A missing girl, there's no evidence she's been murdered. She probably ran off with some traveling salesman.” Frank finished another drink and turned around, reaching for the bottle.
“You think she'd do that, run off in the middle of the night?”
“Riggs said he found blood, but it could be the blood isn't human. There were drag marks, but it could be from some old washing machine she drug off into the bog to get rid of. Ed went looking and see where it got him.”
A thick silence hung in the air between them as she pondered the possibilities. With Ed Riggs gone, her husband had no protector at the station, no one to follow behind. He could be promoted, but then he would fall on his face and that would be an embarrassment. He might be demoted and that would be as bad or worse. He might quit or be fired, but then he would want her father to find him a job. Where would he put her inept husband where he couldn't do any damage?
“I'm going to take a bath and go to bed.” Edna turned and walked down the hall without shutting the television off.
On the screen, a gunfight was brewing outside the saloon. The good guy was clean and well groomed in a new shirt. The bad guy was dressed in black, dirty and with a scar. It was clear who would win. Frank wondered why people watched these things. Then he sat down, pulled a Chesterfield from the pack and lit it with Edna's gold lighter. He took a long, slow sip of his drink and watched as the good guy shot the gun out of the hand of the bad guy without drawing a drop of blood. “Pretty good,” he thought.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 1
The first chill was settling on the fields around the sparse woods by Thompson Bog. The shallow, muddy water that dominated Thompson Wood in Landon County was a dangerous place for anyone. Local legend was filled with stories of people who went in and never came out.
On this night in the autumn of 1954, voices were raised in a trailer house at the end of the swamp. The shrill tones of a young girl were heard, screaming at the top of her voice, “I won't! I'll tell and you can't stop me.”
The door flung open, spraying scant light from the bare bulb across the muddy yard. The girl ran out of the trailer door in Capri pants, dirty, white blouse and bare feet. She was crying.
The girl jumped to the bottom of the crude wooden steps as the door banged on the side of the trailer and slammed shut, closing off the light and leaving the yard once again in total blackness. In the dark of the new moon, clouds hung over the swamp, shutting out the stars.
The door banged opened a second time and the girl turned, half defiant, half fearful. She never heard the sound of the blow. Her body fell to the ground and didn't move. In the dim, eerie glow of the single bulb, a man leaned over the girl, took one wrist and dragged her body across the muddy yard down to the edge of the swamp.
The light from the trailer's bulb seemed to stop at the edge of the bog, making it hard to make out the broken wooden pier and flat-bottomed boat tied there. The man loosened the cinder block that passed for an anchor and tied it to the girl's waist. He took two steps into the bog and dropped the girl in. The cinder block sank below the surface, pulling the girl's body in after. The man stood knee-deep, watching her body sink slowly into the thick, black water.
As the dirty, white blouse disappeared beneath the water, the girl regained consciousness. She opened her mouth to cry out, but the dark, murky water stifled her cry and she slipped below the water line. There were ripples along the surface; cat-tails swayed as she struggled beneath the murky sludge. Then the agitation stopped. All was still again.
The man who had dragged the girl so roughly to her grave stepped back onto the solid ground next to the broken pier. He went to the trailer, turned off the light and closed the door behind him. He went around to a car behind the trailer, got in and, without turning on the lights, sped down the road toward the two-lane blacktop.
A half-hour later, an aging truck came up the road making a racket and bouncing beams of light across sparse trees at the edge of the bog. The loose tools in the back coupled with the age and the poor driving of the inebriated driver made for a noisy ride. Collin Miller stepped out of the truck and opened the door to the trailer, “Clara! Where are ya, girl?” There was no response. The old man stumbled to the back of the trailer and fell onto the bed, unconscious.
The following morning Collin Miller walked into the police station. “My Clara never come home last night,” he told the clerk. “I think she had a man in there whilst I was gone. The place is a mess. T'ain't like her.”
Martha Sawyer took the statement. “We'll look into it,” she said.
It was overcast all day, so mid-afternoon looked near dark when the two detectives made it over to the Miller place to look for signs of the girl.
“She's not here,” said Frank Morton, a detective for the Landon County Police Department. He rocked his hat back on his head, unbuttoned his overcoat and looked around the trailer.
“Nope. But I've got blood out here,” said Detective Sergeant Ed Riggs. He knelt down to get a closer look at the blood, noticing something in the dirt. “Got drag marks, too.”
Detective Morton stood at the door looking down at the dirt. “I don't see 'em.” He pushed his black-framed glasses tighter on his nose and took a flashlight from the pocket of his overcoat. The dim beam of light found the marks in question. “Could have been anything, some piece of trash or old box – anything.”
Ed Riggs stood up, his flashlight in his hand and looked at his partner. How could he not see that the marks were plainly someone being dragged? Ed pulled his overcoat closed against the growing chill and turned his flashlight on. He began walking along side of the drag marks, talking as he went. He was talking; whether his inexperienced partner was listening was his own affair.
“There are two marks here, I'd say something about 80 or 90 pounds, like the Miller girl. There's other footprints but the ground's too hard and uneven, I can't make 'em out. Could be a man in city shoes. Miller's footprints are all over; you can see that he has these farm boots and they're all worn out.” He stopped at the edge of the wood. It was not smart to go into a swamp at night; all manner of things awaited the unwary, things living and things not living.
After a brief discussion with himself, Ed Riggs turned to his partner. Frank Morton's tall, thin body was still silhouetted by the harsh light of the trailer's bare bulb. “You comin'?”
Frank Morton stepped out of the trailer, down the wood step and across the yard to the swamp, careful not to step in the blood.
“Watch it, man, those footprints are evidence. See? They go down to the old boat dock there.”
Both men shined their lights into the dark wood. A small wooden dock, ungainly and broken from years of use with no upkeep, jutted out over the shallow bog. Tied to it was Miller's rowboat. The drag marks went right to the dock and scrapes in the ancient wood continued out to where the boat was tied. Ed Riggs walked toward the dock, followed hesitantly by his partner.
“He dragged her here, but didn't take the boat. Why would he take her this far and not take the boat?” Ed Riggs aimed his flashlight into the boat to see that it held an inch of water. “Oh,” said the Detective Sergeant, and began scanning the swamp with his light.
Large Cypress trees seemed to hold the swamp in place with giant fingers, keeping it from sinking down to where everything ever dropped into the water had gone. The bog was shades of black, creating a barrier against the meager flashlight.
“There's something here, looks like someone stepped in, making a hole in the vegetation. There's something there, too. It seems darker over there, if that's possible.”
The younger detective stood on the pier, not wanting to sully his shoes, as the older detective stepped off into the swamp. He took two steps, then a cautious third.
“This could be solid under here, but there's quick places all over.”
The third step proved him right as Ed Riggs slipped, sinking right up to his neck. He tried to raise a hand, but doing so only pulled him down further, his chin and mouth dipping below the surface. When he pulled his head up, his chin and mouth were covered with gray-brown mud.
“Quick place, Frank! Help me out!”
Frank Morton squatted down on his feet, close to the water. He put his arms on his knees, his hands dangling inward.
“Are ya goin' under, Ed?”
“Yes, you fool, can't you see I'm going under? Pull me out of this crap!”
Frank Morton turned his flashlight off, took a deep breath and looked around. Then he looked back at his partner.
“Well, I would, Ed, but then you wouldn't have the pleasure of meeting Clara Miller while you're down there. Sorry!” Frank chuckled, just enough to let his partner know that he was not sorry. He was not sorry at all.
The thin man watched his partner sink slowly down into the muck. He continued to watch the water churn as Ed Riggs struggled. He watched until the water is still.
“Say 'Hi' to Clara,” he said to the surface of the bog.
Frank Morton stood up, turned on his flashlight and made his way back to the black '52 Ford parked on the dirt road at the edge of the bog. He got in and started the car. Taking the microphone from the cradle he called in.
“This is Frank Morton. Ed Riggs and I came up here to see about the missing Miller girl. Ed fell into the bog and got sucked under before I could get to him. I'm afraid he's gone.” Frank ended the conversation before there could be another side to it. He returned the mic to the holder on the dash and gave the dark woods one final glance, smiling.
“That worked out well,” thought Frank Morton, as he put the car in gear and released the clutch.
The first chill was settling on the fields around the sparse woods by Thompson Bog. The shallow, muddy water that dominated Thompson Wood in Landon County was a dangerous place for anyone. Local legend was filled with stories of people who went in and never came out.
On this night in the autumn of 1954, voices were raised in a trailer house at the end of the swamp. The shrill tones of a young girl were heard, screaming at the top of her voice, “I won't! I'll tell and you can't stop me.”
The door flung open, spraying scant light from the bare bulb across the muddy yard. The girl ran out of the trailer door in Capri pants, dirty, white blouse and bare feet. She was crying.
The girl jumped to the bottom of the crude wooden steps as the door banged on the side of the trailer and slammed shut, closing off the light and leaving the yard once again in total blackness. In the dark of the new moon, clouds hung over the swamp, shutting out the stars.
The door banged opened a second time and the girl turned, half defiant, half fearful. She never heard the sound of the blow. Her body fell to the ground and didn't move. In the dim, eerie glow of the single bulb, a man leaned over the girl, took one wrist and dragged her body across the muddy yard down to the edge of the swamp.
The light from the trailer's bulb seemed to stop at the edge of the bog, making it hard to make out the broken wooden pier and flat-bottomed boat tied there. The man loosened the cinder block that passed for an anchor and tied it to the girl's waist. He took two steps into the bog and dropped the girl in. The cinder block sank below the surface, pulling the girl's body in after. The man stood knee-deep, watching her body sink slowly into the thick, black water.
As the dirty, white blouse disappeared beneath the water, the girl regained consciousness. She opened her mouth to cry out, but the dark, murky water stifled her cry and she slipped below the water line. There were ripples along the surface; cat-tails swayed as she struggled beneath the murky sludge. Then the agitation stopped. All was still again.
The man who had dragged the girl so roughly to her grave stepped back onto the solid ground next to the broken pier. He went to the trailer, turned off the light and closed the door behind him. He went around to a car behind the trailer, got in and, without turning on the lights, sped down the road toward the two-lane blacktop.
A half-hour later, an aging truck came up the road making a racket and bouncing beams of light across sparse trees at the edge of the bog. The loose tools in the back coupled with the age and the poor driving of the inebriated driver made for a noisy ride. Collin Miller stepped out of the truck and opened the door to the trailer, “Clara! Where are ya, girl?” There was no response. The old man stumbled to the back of the trailer and fell onto the bed, unconscious.
The following morning Collin Miller walked into the police station. “My Clara never come home last night,” he told the clerk. “I think she had a man in there whilst I was gone. The place is a mess. T'ain't like her.”
Martha Sawyer took the statement. “We'll look into it,” she said.
It was overcast all day, so mid-afternoon looked near dark when the two detectives made it over to the Miller place to look for signs of the girl.
“She's not here,” said Frank Morton, a detective for the Landon County Police Department. He rocked his hat back on his head, unbuttoned his overcoat and looked around the trailer.
“Nope. But I've got blood out here,” said Detective Sergeant Ed Riggs. He knelt down to get a closer look at the blood, noticing something in the dirt. “Got drag marks, too.”
Detective Morton stood at the door looking down at the dirt. “I don't see 'em.” He pushed his black-framed glasses tighter on his nose and took a flashlight from the pocket of his overcoat. The dim beam of light found the marks in question. “Could have been anything, some piece of trash or old box – anything.”
Ed Riggs stood up, his flashlight in his hand and looked at his partner. How could he not see that the marks were plainly someone being dragged? Ed pulled his overcoat closed against the growing chill and turned his flashlight on. He began walking along side of the drag marks, talking as he went. He was talking; whether his inexperienced partner was listening was his own affair.
“There are two marks here, I'd say something about 80 or 90 pounds, like the Miller girl. There's other footprints but the ground's too hard and uneven, I can't make 'em out. Could be a man in city shoes. Miller's footprints are all over; you can see that he has these farm boots and they're all worn out.” He stopped at the edge of the wood. It was not smart to go into a swamp at night; all manner of things awaited the unwary, things living and things not living.
After a brief discussion with himself, Ed Riggs turned to his partner. Frank Morton's tall, thin body was still silhouetted by the harsh light of the trailer's bare bulb. “You comin'?”
Frank Morton stepped out of the trailer, down the wood step and across the yard to the swamp, careful not to step in the blood.
“Watch it, man, those footprints are evidence. See? They go down to the old boat dock there.”
Both men shined their lights into the dark wood. A small wooden dock, ungainly and broken from years of use with no upkeep, jutted out over the shallow bog. Tied to it was Miller's rowboat. The drag marks went right to the dock and scrapes in the ancient wood continued out to where the boat was tied. Ed Riggs walked toward the dock, followed hesitantly by his partner.
“He dragged her here, but didn't take the boat. Why would he take her this far and not take the boat?” Ed Riggs aimed his flashlight into the boat to see that it held an inch of water. “Oh,” said the Detective Sergeant, and began scanning the swamp with his light.
Large Cypress trees seemed to hold the swamp in place with giant fingers, keeping it from sinking down to where everything ever dropped into the water had gone. The bog was shades of black, creating a barrier against the meager flashlight.
“There's something here, looks like someone stepped in, making a hole in the vegetation. There's something there, too. It seems darker over there, if that's possible.”
The younger detective stood on the pier, not wanting to sully his shoes, as the older detective stepped off into the swamp. He took two steps, then a cautious third.
“This could be solid under here, but there's quick places all over.”
The third step proved him right as Ed Riggs slipped, sinking right up to his neck. He tried to raise a hand, but doing so only pulled him down further, his chin and mouth dipping below the surface. When he pulled his head up, his chin and mouth were covered with gray-brown mud.
“Quick place, Frank! Help me out!”
Frank Morton squatted down on his feet, close to the water. He put his arms on his knees, his hands dangling inward.
“Are ya goin' under, Ed?”
“Yes, you fool, can't you see I'm going under? Pull me out of this crap!”
Frank Morton turned his flashlight off, took a deep breath and looked around. Then he looked back at his partner.
“Well, I would, Ed, but then you wouldn't have the pleasure of meeting Clara Miller while you're down there. Sorry!” Frank chuckled, just enough to let his partner know that he was not sorry. He was not sorry at all.
The thin man watched his partner sink slowly down into the muck. He continued to watch the water churn as Ed Riggs struggled. He watched until the water is still.
“Say 'Hi' to Clara,” he said to the surface of the bog.
Frank Morton stood up, turned on his flashlight and made his way back to the black '52 Ford parked on the dirt road at the edge of the bog. He got in and started the car. Taking the microphone from the cradle he called in.
“This is Frank Morton. Ed Riggs and I came up here to see about the missing Miller girl. Ed fell into the bog and got sucked under before I could get to him. I'm afraid he's gone.” Frank ended the conversation before there could be another side to it. He returned the mic to the holder on the dash and gave the dark woods one final glance, smiling.
“That worked out well,” thought Frank Morton, as he put the car in gear and released the clutch.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Scandal at Shady Point
From the collection: Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 5
By the light of the full moon, Mike Emerson climbed over the fence of the house next to Randy Turner's sisters' house and crossed the lawn to the greenhouse. There was no lock on the greenhouse. It was simply a matter of opening the door quietly, though that in itself was a challenge.
Mike climbed a ladder, put a terracotta pot on the rafter, a thin string around the base of it, a loop of string that went in two strands along the rafter and out one of the broken windows. Beneath it, another terracotta pot sat, as if waiting to be the victim of a prank.
Mike returned to the adjoining yard, gathered the two strings and waited. He waited all day, until nearly dusk. He was fast growing impatient and in danger of being discovered should the neighbor come home from work and find Mike hiding in his yard.
Randy Turner looked both ways before stepping out into his sister's back yard. He was taking no chances. He ran from the back door to the greenhouse, feeling safe once surrounded by his plants. Randy Turner felt that glass and plants could protect him from bullets.
When Mike Emerson pulled the string, the red flower pot fell from the rafter onto its brother below, making a crash that sent Randy Turner to the floor. Mike pulled the string all the way out of the greenhouse, across the yard and over the fence, wadded it up and put it in his pocket. He snuck out of the yard and down the alley to where the ugly rent-a-car was waiting. Randy Turner was sprinting to his sister's back door to call the police.
The following day, Mike returned the green Plymouth, checked out of his motel and bought a beat-up pickup truck cheap. It was on its last legs, but it got him to a town a few miles away where he could lay low and plan his next move.
It was a year of living on edge, waiting for the other shoe to drop. No events took me out of Shady Point to gather news, no reports of anyone shooting at Randy Turner or anyone else, nothing of interest or alarm. And yet....
Dana moved out to a home for battered women where she lived and worked. She wanted to help women whose lives had also been destroyed. That Mike never once hit her was a moot point.
Randy gave up the greenhouse and stayed in his sisters house full time. He became a hermit. Children made up stories about him.
Mike Emerson had vanished.
So when, on a chilly September evening, I was called by my editor to see what was up at the house where Turner was cloistered, it was like an old friend showing up, one I didn't really want to see again.
The police cars were parked at odd angles, their lights turning the night into a kaleidoscope of red and blue. There was crime scene tape and the police were not chuckling. It was time to take something seriously. It was up to me to determine what that was. Sergeant Gillespie was being surprisingly helpful.
“Turner has become a real piece of work since you saw him last.” Sergeant Gillespie indicated the pale figure in khaki pants and bathrobe ensemble standing at the door of the house. Turner was emaciated and looked sick. “He won't wear blue-jeans, won't own a wallet or keys. He stays in the house twenty-four-seven. His sister says she that since his savings ran out, she supports him completely. She doesn't know what else to do.”
We stood there together, watching the broken man talk to the officers at the door, looking around as if he had never seen outside before. He didn't look toward the police car with Dana Emerson getting out. She didn't look at him either. The lovers who had started this string of events couldn't face each other.
Dana was taken to the side of the house across the street from Turner's sister's house. Gillespie didn't even try to stop me from going over. Still, I held a respectful distance. On the ground was the body of Mike Emerson. He was dead. A .22 rifle lay beside him. Dana looked at the body, nodded her head and turned around to walk back to the squad car. She had identified the body and now could be taken home. She had no tears left.
“Our guess is that he was on the roof, working on getting an angle with his rifle, waiting for Turner to pass by a window or poke his head out. This house is empty, for sale. It looks like he's been here for quite a while, waiting for his shot.”
Gillespie closed his notebook and looked across the street to the squad car as Dana Emerson got in. She didn't look up at Turner.
Twenty feet away, Randy Turner took one more look at the outside and retreated into the house.
“Emerson didn't know it, but he already killed Turner – and Dana. They're both dead to the world.”
“I guess he wanted to complete the picture,” I said, closing my notebook as well. “Now they're all dead.”
Gillespie just nodded, turning back to his crime scene. I walked back to my car, reviewing the story from the not-so-innocent start. “He'll never find out,” she must have said to herself. And now here we are, in the dark of night at a crime scene, all because Randy Turner grabbed the wrong pair of jeans.
Episode 5
By the light of the full moon, Mike Emerson climbed over the fence of the house next to Randy Turner's sisters' house and crossed the lawn to the greenhouse. There was no lock on the greenhouse. It was simply a matter of opening the door quietly, though that in itself was a challenge.
Mike climbed a ladder, put a terracotta pot on the rafter, a thin string around the base of it, a loop of string that went in two strands along the rafter and out one of the broken windows. Beneath it, another terracotta pot sat, as if waiting to be the victim of a prank.
Mike returned to the adjoining yard, gathered the two strings and waited. He waited all day, until nearly dusk. He was fast growing impatient and in danger of being discovered should the neighbor come home from work and find Mike hiding in his yard.
Randy Turner looked both ways before stepping out into his sister's back yard. He was taking no chances. He ran from the back door to the greenhouse, feeling safe once surrounded by his plants. Randy Turner felt that glass and plants could protect him from bullets.
When Mike Emerson pulled the string, the red flower pot fell from the rafter onto its brother below, making a crash that sent Randy Turner to the floor. Mike pulled the string all the way out of the greenhouse, across the yard and over the fence, wadded it up and put it in his pocket. He snuck out of the yard and down the alley to where the ugly rent-a-car was waiting. Randy Turner was sprinting to his sister's back door to call the police.
The following day, Mike returned the green Plymouth, checked out of his motel and bought a beat-up pickup truck cheap. It was on its last legs, but it got him to a town a few miles away where he could lay low and plan his next move.
It was a year of living on edge, waiting for the other shoe to drop. No events took me out of Shady Point to gather news, no reports of anyone shooting at Randy Turner or anyone else, nothing of interest or alarm. And yet....
Dana moved out to a home for battered women where she lived and worked. She wanted to help women whose lives had also been destroyed. That Mike never once hit her was a moot point.
Randy gave up the greenhouse and stayed in his sisters house full time. He became a hermit. Children made up stories about him.
Mike Emerson had vanished.
So when, on a chilly September evening, I was called by my editor to see what was up at the house where Turner was cloistered, it was like an old friend showing up, one I didn't really want to see again.
The police cars were parked at odd angles, their lights turning the night into a kaleidoscope of red and blue. There was crime scene tape and the police were not chuckling. It was time to take something seriously. It was up to me to determine what that was. Sergeant Gillespie was being surprisingly helpful.
“Turner has become a real piece of work since you saw him last.” Sergeant Gillespie indicated the pale figure in khaki pants and bathrobe ensemble standing at the door of the house. Turner was emaciated and looked sick. “He won't wear blue-jeans, won't own a wallet or keys. He stays in the house twenty-four-seven. His sister says she that since his savings ran out, she supports him completely. She doesn't know what else to do.”
We stood there together, watching the broken man talk to the officers at the door, looking around as if he had never seen outside before. He didn't look toward the police car with Dana Emerson getting out. She didn't look at him either. The lovers who had started this string of events couldn't face each other.
Dana was taken to the side of the house across the street from Turner's sister's house. Gillespie didn't even try to stop me from going over. Still, I held a respectful distance. On the ground was the body of Mike Emerson. He was dead. A .22 rifle lay beside him. Dana looked at the body, nodded her head and turned around to walk back to the squad car. She had identified the body and now could be taken home. She had no tears left.
“Our guess is that he was on the roof, working on getting an angle with his rifle, waiting for Turner to pass by a window or poke his head out. This house is empty, for sale. It looks like he's been here for quite a while, waiting for his shot.”
Gillespie closed his notebook and looked across the street to the squad car as Dana Emerson got in. She didn't look up at Turner.
Twenty feet away, Randy Turner took one more look at the outside and retreated into the house.
“Emerson didn't know it, but he already killed Turner – and Dana. They're both dead to the world.”
“I guess he wanted to complete the picture,” I said, closing my notebook as well. “Now they're all dead.”
Gillespie just nodded, turning back to his crime scene. I walked back to my car, reviewing the story from the not-so-innocent start. “He'll never find out,” she must have said to herself. And now here we are, in the dark of night at a crime scene, all because Randy Turner grabbed the wrong pair of jeans.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Scandal at Shady Point
From the collection: Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 4
Mike Emerson sold his truck, took a room at a small, ramshackle motel out of town and rented a beat up hulk from “Wrent-a-Wreck.” It was a green Plymouth from back when there were green Plymouths. In it, he sat outside Rick and Lori's house watching Dana as she left in Lori's car. He followed her to the mall in town where she met briefly with a man who gave her a paper shopping bag. There were words, but no hugs, no kisses. Dana was keeping her distance and so was the man.
The man shook his head and said a single word that Mike could read on his lips. “Sorry.” He then got into an aging Honda and drove to the city, to a small bank where he stayed until it closed. Then the man drove to a house in a used-to-be-OK part of town, now a place where you wouldn't walk at night. The man appeared heart-sore about the matter, as if he wished he could go back and undo it all, just erase it. He was sick to his stomach, so much so that he never noticed the beat-up green Plymouth following him home.
Mike waited a week, watching the rhythm of the neighborhood. On a dark, cloudy day that threatened rain, he went up to the man's door, just before the bank was scheduled to close. Mike wrote the word “Adulterer” across the door in black marker. He went to the bushes across the street and waited with his rifle. He waited without moving for three-quarters of an hour.
At five-thirty, the gray Honda pulled up to the curb and the man got out. He went to the door, his keys in his hand. Mike raised the rifle to his shoulder and looked down the barrel, putting the word he had written on the house in his cross-hairs. As the man hesitated with his key, Mike could see his head turn slightly. He could see his shoulders tighten as he sucked in a deep breath. The man realized what it meant and who wrote it. Mike squeezed the trigger.
The heat of that late-spring evening was nothing compared to the day eight weeks later when I received a call that Randy Turner had been shot at again. It was outside his place of work, a small branch bank. He had been going to his car after work when a shot rang out. There was a bullet hole through the left side-mirror of his car, having passed between the car and his body as he was about to open the door.
I arrived to find a shaky Randy Turner, again surrounded by reassuring police and Sergeant Gillespie looking at all the angles. When I walked up to the tape, Gillespie was squatting down, peering through the hole in the side-mirror, guessing the trajectory of the slug.
“Somehow I knew I would see you here,” said the Sergeant.
“Where's Sheriff Willis?” I asked, looking around.
“May not be related,” the Sergeant said, wiping his hands on a crumpled handkerchief.
“That's what my father said whenever I screwed up. How is this not related?”
“Nothing written on the car, no slug found,” the Sergeant turned slightly in the direction of the front of the car where the slug would have gone, if it existed at all, then toward the other direction where the shooter, if there was a shooter, would have stood. “No shell casing. This might even have been a set-up.”
“You mean Turner might have shot his own mirror? What, for attention?”
“Something like that. There's nothing to say that the two incidents are in any way connected, save that the same man was nearly, allegedly, shot.”
“So you don't think that Mike Emerson...”
“I didn't say that. I didn't say anything. I'm not even standing here.” Sergeant Gillespie walked away, calling one of the uniforms over to him. Apparently, he had urgent business with that patrolman and none with me.
Officers continued to look over the wall in front of the car and across the street for a place where a man could have stood to fire a shot. They found nothing. There was no gunshot residue, no shell casing, no tell-tale candy wrapper or dropped library card saying “Mike Emerson” on it. In short, there was nothing to indicate that a bullet had been fired at all except Mr. Turner's statement, shards of broken mirror on the ground and a hole through the mirror-housing.
I stood by the tape barrier, trying to extend my ear to hear the whispers being exchanged by Sergeant and patrolman.
“Got something here!” yelled a patrolman, the same one who found the shell casing eight weeks earlier. Gillespie rolled his eyes; apparently, the talk they had about shouting things out at a crime scene had not had it's desired effect. “He could have stood here.”
There was no tape across the street, so I beat Gillespie over there. Sure enough, there was a small alcove in the side of the building across the street that could have held a man out of sight. Yes, one could have stood there out of view, aimed a rifle and fired at the car. Yes, it was possible, but only possible. There was no evidence to indicate that it was the case. Right now, it was just supposition, and supposition, as the Sergeant said, was not my job.
As I left, I heard one of the officers saying to another, “Crying wolf, isn't he?” The other one replied, “I don't know, he could have done this himself.”
After that, Randy Turner moved out of his townhouse and back with his sister. He quit his job and became a recluse.
Mike had prepared this for eight weeks. The board he had prepared was thick enough to take and hold a .22 slug. The place he had found to stand was perfect for where Randy Turner parked his car. The tarp would keep gunshot residue from being found on the short, stucco wall.
Mike already had the shot lined up when Randy Turner came out of the bank. Just as Turner walked up to the door, about to reach out and open the door, Mike squeezed off the shot. The bullet went through the mirror, shattering the glass. It then buried itself in the board behind the bush in front of the car.
Randy Turner spun around and ran back into the bank as Mike wrapped the rifle in the tarp and returned it to his green Plymouth. He drove around to the side of the building on the far side of the street, pulled the rope attached to the board and retrieved both board and slug. He was gone before the police arrived. No one would ever know he was there.
By late September, Randy Turner had stopped going out completely. The only time he left his sister's house was to go across the backyard to the greenhouse. He had been renovating the discarded greenhouse and it was his only diversion.
On the third Saturday in September, a flowerpot shattered and Randy Turner dove for the floor. He crawled to the door, sprinted to the back door of the house and called the police.
Gillespie was watching for me as I drove up. He didn't ask what I was doing there. He didn't even have tape put up.
The police were confounded. The flower pot was broken inside the glass greenhouse, and yet there was no bullet hole through the glass. No bullet could be found near the broken flower pot, no shell casing in, around or anywhere near the greenhouse.
“Unless he fired the shot inside the greenhouse, there's no way he could have done this without breaking a window,” said the patrolman. Gillespie just shook his head. He had no solution for how to shut the cop up when in the presence of the press at a crime scene.
“So there was no bullet, no shell and no possible place for the shooter to shoot from, and yet a flower pot was shattered?” I asked, making a note in my notebook.
“Here y'go!” said another patrolman, standing on a ladder and looking at the rafter above. “There's a scuff mark up here, looks like there was a pot sitting here where the scuff mark is. Must've fallen and hit the other pot.”
“Oh, yeah? How did it get up there?” yelled Turner, frantically pointing; his eyes wild with fear. “He's messing with me! He's out to get me and you've got to stop him!”
The police gathered themselves up and walked toward the squad cars, chuckling to each other. Randy Turner had gone from cheating boyfriend to hapless victim to running joke.
Episode 4
Mike Emerson sold his truck, took a room at a small, ramshackle motel out of town and rented a beat up hulk from “Wrent-a-Wreck.” It was a green Plymouth from back when there were green Plymouths. In it, he sat outside Rick and Lori's house watching Dana as she left in Lori's car. He followed her to the mall in town where she met briefly with a man who gave her a paper shopping bag. There were words, but no hugs, no kisses. Dana was keeping her distance and so was the man.
The man shook his head and said a single word that Mike could read on his lips. “Sorry.” He then got into an aging Honda and drove to the city, to a small bank where he stayed until it closed. Then the man drove to a house in a used-to-be-OK part of town, now a place where you wouldn't walk at night. The man appeared heart-sore about the matter, as if he wished he could go back and undo it all, just erase it. He was sick to his stomach, so much so that he never noticed the beat-up green Plymouth following him home.
Mike waited a week, watching the rhythm of the neighborhood. On a dark, cloudy day that threatened rain, he went up to the man's door, just before the bank was scheduled to close. Mike wrote the word “Adulterer” across the door in black marker. He went to the bushes across the street and waited with his rifle. He waited without moving for three-quarters of an hour.
At five-thirty, the gray Honda pulled up to the curb and the man got out. He went to the door, his keys in his hand. Mike raised the rifle to his shoulder and looked down the barrel, putting the word he had written on the house in his cross-hairs. As the man hesitated with his key, Mike could see his head turn slightly. He could see his shoulders tighten as he sucked in a deep breath. The man realized what it meant and who wrote it. Mike squeezed the trigger.
The heat of that late-spring evening was nothing compared to the day eight weeks later when I received a call that Randy Turner had been shot at again. It was outside his place of work, a small branch bank. He had been going to his car after work when a shot rang out. There was a bullet hole through the left side-mirror of his car, having passed between the car and his body as he was about to open the door.
I arrived to find a shaky Randy Turner, again surrounded by reassuring police and Sergeant Gillespie looking at all the angles. When I walked up to the tape, Gillespie was squatting down, peering through the hole in the side-mirror, guessing the trajectory of the slug.
“Somehow I knew I would see you here,” said the Sergeant.
“Where's Sheriff Willis?” I asked, looking around.
“May not be related,” the Sergeant said, wiping his hands on a crumpled handkerchief.
“That's what my father said whenever I screwed up. How is this not related?”
“Nothing written on the car, no slug found,” the Sergeant turned slightly in the direction of the front of the car where the slug would have gone, if it existed at all, then toward the other direction where the shooter, if there was a shooter, would have stood. “No shell casing. This might even have been a set-up.”
“You mean Turner might have shot his own mirror? What, for attention?”
“Something like that. There's nothing to say that the two incidents are in any way connected, save that the same man was nearly, allegedly, shot.”
“So you don't think that Mike Emerson...”
“I didn't say that. I didn't say anything. I'm not even standing here.” Sergeant Gillespie walked away, calling one of the uniforms over to him. Apparently, he had urgent business with that patrolman and none with me.
Officers continued to look over the wall in front of the car and across the street for a place where a man could have stood to fire a shot. They found nothing. There was no gunshot residue, no shell casing, no tell-tale candy wrapper or dropped library card saying “Mike Emerson” on it. In short, there was nothing to indicate that a bullet had been fired at all except Mr. Turner's statement, shards of broken mirror on the ground and a hole through the mirror-housing.
I stood by the tape barrier, trying to extend my ear to hear the whispers being exchanged by Sergeant and patrolman.
“Got something here!” yelled a patrolman, the same one who found the shell casing eight weeks earlier. Gillespie rolled his eyes; apparently, the talk they had about shouting things out at a crime scene had not had it's desired effect. “He could have stood here.”
There was no tape across the street, so I beat Gillespie over there. Sure enough, there was a small alcove in the side of the building across the street that could have held a man out of sight. Yes, one could have stood there out of view, aimed a rifle and fired at the car. Yes, it was possible, but only possible. There was no evidence to indicate that it was the case. Right now, it was just supposition, and supposition, as the Sergeant said, was not my job.
As I left, I heard one of the officers saying to another, “Crying wolf, isn't he?” The other one replied, “I don't know, he could have done this himself.”
After that, Randy Turner moved out of his townhouse and back with his sister. He quit his job and became a recluse.
Mike had prepared this for eight weeks. The board he had prepared was thick enough to take and hold a .22 slug. The place he had found to stand was perfect for where Randy Turner parked his car. The tarp would keep gunshot residue from being found on the short, stucco wall.
Mike already had the shot lined up when Randy Turner came out of the bank. Just as Turner walked up to the door, about to reach out and open the door, Mike squeezed off the shot. The bullet went through the mirror, shattering the glass. It then buried itself in the board behind the bush in front of the car.
Randy Turner spun around and ran back into the bank as Mike wrapped the rifle in the tarp and returned it to his green Plymouth. He drove around to the side of the building on the far side of the street, pulled the rope attached to the board and retrieved both board and slug. He was gone before the police arrived. No one would ever know he was there.
By late September, Randy Turner had stopped going out completely. The only time he left his sister's house was to go across the backyard to the greenhouse. He had been renovating the discarded greenhouse and it was his only diversion.
On the third Saturday in September, a flowerpot shattered and Randy Turner dove for the floor. He crawled to the door, sprinted to the back door of the house and called the police.
Gillespie was watching for me as I drove up. He didn't ask what I was doing there. He didn't even have tape put up.
The police were confounded. The flower pot was broken inside the glass greenhouse, and yet there was no bullet hole through the glass. No bullet could be found near the broken flower pot, no shell casing in, around or anywhere near the greenhouse.
“Unless he fired the shot inside the greenhouse, there's no way he could have done this without breaking a window,” said the patrolman. Gillespie just shook his head. He had no solution for how to shut the cop up when in the presence of the press at a crime scene.
“So there was no bullet, no shell and no possible place for the shooter to shoot from, and yet a flower pot was shattered?” I asked, making a note in my notebook.
“Here y'go!” said another patrolman, standing on a ladder and looking at the rafter above. “There's a scuff mark up here, looks like there was a pot sitting here where the scuff mark is. Must've fallen and hit the other pot.”
“Oh, yeah? How did it get up there?” yelled Turner, frantically pointing; his eyes wild with fear. “He's messing with me! He's out to get me and you've got to stop him!”
The police gathered themselves up and walked toward the squad cars, chuckling to each other. Randy Turner had gone from cheating boyfriend to hapless victim to running joke.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Scandal at Shady Point
From the collection: Murder at Thompson Bog
Episode 3
Dana sat on the couch at her friend, Lori's house. Lori had been a bride's maid at her wedding and Dana had returned the favor a month later. Now Lori and her husband, Rick, sat at the table and looked at her, not knowing what to say.
“I screwed up,” said Dana.
“Yes, you did,” replied Lori. “Won't he forgive you? Maybe if you went to him.”
“He won't even talk to me. He wants to know the name ...”
“So, tell him!” Rick raised the volume of the conversation, eliciting a harsh look from Lori.
“He'll kill him,” said Dana. “He's got a gun.”
“Oh, he wouldn't actually kill him,” said Lori. She knew Mike; he couldn't do anything like that any more than Rick could. Of course, she wasn't cheating on Rick in their bed with a stranger, either.
“Yes, he would, he will. I've never seen him like this.” Dana hung her head and let the tears flow. Lori and Rick looked at each other. Neither had a clue what to do.
As night fell, Dana was wide awake on Rick and Lori's couch, Mike was wide awake at the kitchen table and Sheriff Willis was fast asleep in his bed next to his wife, Martha.
By eleven-forty-five that night, Mike Emerson was on his third glass of rye whiskey; not a short, polite glass, but a large, soda-sized glass. He had nearly polished off the bottle.
“My jeans, my wallet, my keys, my wife,” he kept repeating. He had emptied all his accounts and canceled his cards. It was unlikely the thief ― of his wallet, jeans and wife ― would spend more than the two hundred dollars now. If he tried to use the cards he would find them closed. If he tried to use the key, he would find new locks.
Mike positioned the butt of the rifle on the floor, resting his chin on the barrel as his hand slid slowly down to the trigger housing. But if the man wanted to take his truck, he could do that ― he had the key. Mike's finger found the trigger and felt the small ridges in the metal. He wondered, if he were to pull the trigger, if his head would be blown off, or would the bullet just rattle around in his skull, making scrambled eggs of his gray cells. He smiled to think of Dana having to clean up his blood and brains from the ceiling.
Mike sighed a heavy sigh, leaned forward, a ringing in his head, his finger on the trigger of the rifle and let his head fall forward. The barrel was just above his ear when the gun went off, putting a hole in the ceiling and a different ringing in Mike's ear.
Mike stood up, opened the bolt freeing the spent shell, put another bullet in the chamber and closed the bolt. He picked up a small bag of things he had packed, went out to his truck, got in and drove out of the driveway into the night. The .22 rifle was on the seat beside him.
At midnight, the Sheriff's Office got a call that a single gunshot was heard from Mike's house. Sheriff Willis was called and hurried over there to find two deputies waiting at the locked door. They had to force the door to get in. They found a single .22 caliber shell casing on the living room floor and no one inside the house. No blood, no body, no Mike.
“I've got to question him,” said Sheriff Willis to Dana. They were in the front doorway of Rick and Lori's house. Dana was wearing Lori's housecoat, her hair hadn't been touched since her restless sleep, and showed it. Her face was wrinkled from the sheets and puffy from crying.
“Can't we leave him out of it?” she pleaded.
“He's in it, up to his neck. This has gone beyond a one-time fling gone wrong, there was a shot fired and Mike is missing.”
“Randy Turner,” said Dana. She sighed heavily. “He lives in town. He's an old friend from school. We didn't mean this to happen; it just did.”
As a reporter for the local paper, I was called to the scene by my editor and asked to see if this was really a story for the Shady Point News. I dutifully wrote down the name “Randy Turner.” From town, I thought. Interesting.
Usually people from town didn't come to Shady Point, they didn't consider it a vacation or even interesting. They went to the shore or into the mountains or Disney World. Shady Point was for people who never saw a mountain or a lake. Three-quarters of the houses are empty most of the year, absentee owners who come to get away from the big city or kept as rentals for the peak season.
“Any luck with Turner?” I asked Sheriff Willis.
“It's not a story, it's a spat. Just leave it alone.”
“Mike's gone missing. His boss hasn't seen him, he hasn't been in touch with his wife or with you. So I have to ask, any sign of foul play from the boyfriend?”
“He's not a boyfriend, I don't know what he is.”
“Is he a suspect?” I was half asking as a reporter but also because I live there too. If one of Shady Point's residents was suspected of foul play to another, it was news, but it was also terrible.
“No, he's not a suspect. He's a person of interest, a possible source of information in a missing person's case, nothing more. Like I said, it's not a story.”
At Randy Turner's place in the city, it became a story.
Turner was recently divorced, living with his sister after the breakup until he moved into a less-than-attractive set of row townhouses. He was paying a staggering alimony to his ex-wife of barely three years. He had indeed gone to school with Dana but there was no sign that the two had been close.
It was shortly after Mike disappeared that Randy Turner returned home to find “Adulterer” written in marker on his door at eye-level. He stopped for a moment to look at the marking when a bullet struck the house right next to the door. Randy Turner frantically turned the key, threw open the front door and dove behind the couch.
The call went out on the police scanner, my editor heard it and called me. It was fifteen minutes later that I stood behind the yellow barrier tape at Randy Turner's townhouse.
“What are you doing here, Calvin?” asked the Sheriff.
“Might ask you the same thing, Sheriff Willis. As for me, it's a story now.”
“Just a related happening, not a story.”
“Someone shooting at Randy Turner with a .22 caliber bullet. You don't call that a story?”
Sheriff Willis was trying to ignore me. A large man in rolled shirtsleeves came up to the tape. The badge on his belt showed he was a Sergeant of Detectives.
“He doesn't know anything. He hasn't heard from Emerson since the incident, either one of them.”
“Um, Sergeant Gillespie, this is Jake Calvin, reporter for the Shady Point News.” Sheriff Willis emphasized the word 'reporter' for the Sergeant. The Sergeant was suitably impressed.
“Press, eh? Well, nothing much to write about. Looks like a random shooting, probably someone celebrating the Fourth of July early.”
“And calling his shots, eh?” I asked, indicating the single word written on the door. “Looks like he meant to miss. At that distance, it's hard not to.”
“Supposition is not your job, Mr. Calvin,” said Gillespie. “There is nothing to support a theory that this incident is connected with any earlier incident.”
“Except, of course, the presence of Sheriff Willis.” I smiled at Gillespie.
“Found it, sir,” came a shout from across the street. A small group of police had been searching the grounds of the opposing apartment complex and the bushes that surrounded the buildings. One of the officers was now crossing the street with his tiny find raised high.
“It's a shell casing,” he called to the Sergeant. “Twenty-two caliber, just like you thought. No other sign of Emerson.”
Gillespie looked at me like the cat was out of the bag. “See?” he said to me, “No sign of Emerson. So it's not related. No need for you to be here.”
Gillespie walked off with Sheriff Willis toward the townhouse where the shaking Turner was surrounded by police, drinking coffee like it was a cold, winter night. But it wasn't a cold, winter night, it was late spring and it was hot. After a few minutes talking with Turner, Sheriff Willis came back to the tape.
“You still here?”
“It's still a story.”
“It's a dead end. He didn't see anything, didn't hear anything, just something hitting the house, then he dove inside.”
“Yeah, but still, Turner has been served. Mike Emerson knows who – and where – he is.” The look on Willis' face told me that he knew I was right. The game was on.
Episode 3
Dana sat on the couch at her friend, Lori's house. Lori had been a bride's maid at her wedding and Dana had returned the favor a month later. Now Lori and her husband, Rick, sat at the table and looked at her, not knowing what to say.
“I screwed up,” said Dana.
“Yes, you did,” replied Lori. “Won't he forgive you? Maybe if you went to him.”
“He won't even talk to me. He wants to know the name ...”
“So, tell him!” Rick raised the volume of the conversation, eliciting a harsh look from Lori.
“He'll kill him,” said Dana. “He's got a gun.”
“Oh, he wouldn't actually kill him,” said Lori. She knew Mike; he couldn't do anything like that any more than Rick could. Of course, she wasn't cheating on Rick in their bed with a stranger, either.
“Yes, he would, he will. I've never seen him like this.” Dana hung her head and let the tears flow. Lori and Rick looked at each other. Neither had a clue what to do.
As night fell, Dana was wide awake on Rick and Lori's couch, Mike was wide awake at the kitchen table and Sheriff Willis was fast asleep in his bed next to his wife, Martha.
By eleven-forty-five that night, Mike Emerson was on his third glass of rye whiskey; not a short, polite glass, but a large, soda-sized glass. He had nearly polished off the bottle.
“My jeans, my wallet, my keys, my wife,” he kept repeating. He had emptied all his accounts and canceled his cards. It was unlikely the thief ― of his wallet, jeans and wife ― would spend more than the two hundred dollars now. If he tried to use the cards he would find them closed. If he tried to use the key, he would find new locks.
Mike positioned the butt of the rifle on the floor, resting his chin on the barrel as his hand slid slowly down to the trigger housing. But if the man wanted to take his truck, he could do that ― he had the key. Mike's finger found the trigger and felt the small ridges in the metal. He wondered, if he were to pull the trigger, if his head would be blown off, or would the bullet just rattle around in his skull, making scrambled eggs of his gray cells. He smiled to think of Dana having to clean up his blood and brains from the ceiling.
Mike sighed a heavy sigh, leaned forward, a ringing in his head, his finger on the trigger of the rifle and let his head fall forward. The barrel was just above his ear when the gun went off, putting a hole in the ceiling and a different ringing in Mike's ear.
Mike stood up, opened the bolt freeing the spent shell, put another bullet in the chamber and closed the bolt. He picked up a small bag of things he had packed, went out to his truck, got in and drove out of the driveway into the night. The .22 rifle was on the seat beside him.
At midnight, the Sheriff's Office got a call that a single gunshot was heard from Mike's house. Sheriff Willis was called and hurried over there to find two deputies waiting at the locked door. They had to force the door to get in. They found a single .22 caliber shell casing on the living room floor and no one inside the house. No blood, no body, no Mike.
“I've got to question him,” said Sheriff Willis to Dana. They were in the front doorway of Rick and Lori's house. Dana was wearing Lori's housecoat, her hair hadn't been touched since her restless sleep, and showed it. Her face was wrinkled from the sheets and puffy from crying.
“Can't we leave him out of it?” she pleaded.
“He's in it, up to his neck. This has gone beyond a one-time fling gone wrong, there was a shot fired and Mike is missing.”
“Randy Turner,” said Dana. She sighed heavily. “He lives in town. He's an old friend from school. We didn't mean this to happen; it just did.”
As a reporter for the local paper, I was called to the scene by my editor and asked to see if this was really a story for the Shady Point News. I dutifully wrote down the name “Randy Turner.” From town, I thought. Interesting.
Usually people from town didn't come to Shady Point, they didn't consider it a vacation or even interesting. They went to the shore or into the mountains or Disney World. Shady Point was for people who never saw a mountain or a lake. Three-quarters of the houses are empty most of the year, absentee owners who come to get away from the big city or kept as rentals for the peak season.
“Any luck with Turner?” I asked Sheriff Willis.
“It's not a story, it's a spat. Just leave it alone.”
“Mike's gone missing. His boss hasn't seen him, he hasn't been in touch with his wife or with you. So I have to ask, any sign of foul play from the boyfriend?”
“He's not a boyfriend, I don't know what he is.”
“Is he a suspect?” I was half asking as a reporter but also because I live there too. If one of Shady Point's residents was suspected of foul play to another, it was news, but it was also terrible.
“No, he's not a suspect. He's a person of interest, a possible source of information in a missing person's case, nothing more. Like I said, it's not a story.”
At Randy Turner's place in the city, it became a story.
Turner was recently divorced, living with his sister after the breakup until he moved into a less-than-attractive set of row townhouses. He was paying a staggering alimony to his ex-wife of barely three years. He had indeed gone to school with Dana but there was no sign that the two had been close.
It was shortly after Mike disappeared that Randy Turner returned home to find “Adulterer” written in marker on his door at eye-level. He stopped for a moment to look at the marking when a bullet struck the house right next to the door. Randy Turner frantically turned the key, threw open the front door and dove behind the couch.
The call went out on the police scanner, my editor heard it and called me. It was fifteen minutes later that I stood behind the yellow barrier tape at Randy Turner's townhouse.
“What are you doing here, Calvin?” asked the Sheriff.
“Might ask you the same thing, Sheriff Willis. As for me, it's a story now.”
“Just a related happening, not a story.”
“Someone shooting at Randy Turner with a .22 caliber bullet. You don't call that a story?”
Sheriff Willis was trying to ignore me. A large man in rolled shirtsleeves came up to the tape. The badge on his belt showed he was a Sergeant of Detectives.
“He doesn't know anything. He hasn't heard from Emerson since the incident, either one of them.”
“Um, Sergeant Gillespie, this is Jake Calvin, reporter for the Shady Point News.” Sheriff Willis emphasized the word 'reporter' for the Sergeant. The Sergeant was suitably impressed.
“Press, eh? Well, nothing much to write about. Looks like a random shooting, probably someone celebrating the Fourth of July early.”
“And calling his shots, eh?” I asked, indicating the single word written on the door. “Looks like he meant to miss. At that distance, it's hard not to.”
“Supposition is not your job, Mr. Calvin,” said Gillespie. “There is nothing to support a theory that this incident is connected with any earlier incident.”
“Except, of course, the presence of Sheriff Willis.” I smiled at Gillespie.
“Found it, sir,” came a shout from across the street. A small group of police had been searching the grounds of the opposing apartment complex and the bushes that surrounded the buildings. One of the officers was now crossing the street with his tiny find raised high.
“It's a shell casing,” he called to the Sergeant. “Twenty-two caliber, just like you thought. No other sign of Emerson.”
Gillespie looked at me like the cat was out of the bag. “See?” he said to me, “No sign of Emerson. So it's not related. No need for you to be here.”
Gillespie walked off with Sheriff Willis toward the townhouse where the shaking Turner was surrounded by police, drinking coffee like it was a cold, winter night. But it wasn't a cold, winter night, it was late spring and it was hot. After a few minutes talking with Turner, Sheriff Willis came back to the tape.
“You still here?”
“It's still a story.”
“It's a dead end. He didn't see anything, didn't hear anything, just something hitting the house, then he dove inside.”
“Yeah, but still, Turner has been served. Mike Emerson knows who – and where – he is.” The look on Willis' face told me that he knew I was right. The game was on.
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