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.