by Ron Hudson
“No ma’am, no ma’am, neither one of us ever seen them two men except when they were part of the bunch that attacked us at Flood’s,” replied Strep.
Caley, turning up the pressure a little bit, “you know these men have been part of this community for many years, it is hard to believe you never saw them.”
Again, both men said at once, “Oh no we ain’t never seen them. We have seen that one they call Big Al though. He’s the one that was controlling the dog when he bit us. But you know we want to take back all the charges we put against them people at Flood’s, cause they all, every one of them, are part of the bunch that done come by here after the tornado and helped fix up our house. We done made up with them and everything is alright now,” said Strep.
“Well maybe so, but whoever killed the two men is still out there. I need to find out who that is. Now when I was here before, both of you were awful mad at Homer and Henry because you thought they were part of the group that put the dog on you. Is it possible that you two decided to take your own revenge on them?”
Turning to the murder of Harley Kettle, Caley said, “Do either of you know a man named Harley Kettle?”
Both men replied that they had never heard of Harley.
“Have you heard that he has been killed?”
Strep nervously replied, “Oh my God. Not another murder. I knew we made a mistake by talking to that evil man, Fuzz, about our problem. His bad spirit has gone and hurt someone else.”
“Look Strep, you told me about Fuzz before, but now I need you to tell me some more about what you think Fuzz did.”
Strep took his time telling Caley the whole story from the beginning. He told her how he and Topop were attacked by Chester, and how Pastor Pink had reported it to the sheriff, but nothing was done. Then he went into the details about how he and Topop got Fuzz to cast a haint on the men. His excited manner of telling the story caused Caley to feel that the two men were genuinely concerned that they had been responsible for all the havoc, including the murders. They were both thoroughly convinced that Fuzz’s spell was now responsible for another catastrophe.
The discussion continued for quite a while. She did nothing to dissuade the men their contract with Fuzz hadn’t caused the problems. While she didn’t believe for a moment that it had anything to do with the incidents, she was hoping that Strep and Topop would reveal some small detail that might lead somewhere.
She suggested that they might have murdered men themselves, to prove the validity of Fuzz’s spell. They both vehemently denied such a theory. In spite of everything they told her, she still felt that their nervous avoidance of some questions made them look as if they were hiding or lying about something.
Then Caley, not telling the whole truth said, “Topop I have information that you were up near that whiskey still just before the men were killed. What were you doing up there?”
“Oh, no ma’am, not me. It had to be somebody else. I don’t even know where they were making whiskey.”
“Who else could it have been?”
Strep, now very agitated answered the question, “we ain’t had nothing to do with dem killings, but we might know who did.”
The pressure seemed to be getting Caley someplace. While she really didn’t think the men had anything to do with the killings, she did think they knew more than they were telling. She continued taunting them to see if they might reveal anything of importance. Then Strep apprehensively said, “Oh Lord, I knew we shouldn’t a done it. The minute we did, I done noed we done wrong.”
“Tell me what you did Strep.”
Strep did most of the talking. He took a long time to go through attacks on them by Chester at Flood’s Place, how Pastor Pink had called the sheriff’s office and got no satisfaction. Then they decided to resort to their last hope. They turned to Fuzz asking him to place a hex on all of the bikers at Flood’s. Topop’s eyes grew wider and wider as Strep talked, just nodding his head occasionally in agreement.
“Lord, we didn’t mean for it to get out of hand, but we are guilty of the whole thing by having Mr. Fuzz put a haint on them. The haint got out of control. That’s what caused the tornado to drop down on the church and us. We will never be forgiven.”
Caley seeing some humor in the revelation did not let on that she thought Strep’s assumption was ludicrous said, “So you didn’t actually go up there and shoot the men. All you did was put a hex on them, is that correct?”
Finally, Topop decided to speak up, “We didn’t even do no hex. It was old man Fuzz and that Oba person up there at Shelltown. We didn’t want no killing. We just wanted to have something bad happen to them motorcycle people for sicing that dog on us. We went back to old man Fuzz and told him to take the hex off, but he said it was too late. He said he couldn’t take it off, even though we begged him to do so.”
Caley asked Strep and Topop a few more questions then said, “Is this Mr. Fuzz an old black man who always has a dog with him?”
“Dat’s him. The dog’s name is Cricket, and she has as much spiritual power as Fuzz does. He never does anything without talking to the dog about it first. I never seen her do it, but he says she can talk. Also, that old man called Oba is the one who Fuzz goes to when he wants a really big hex sent out. That’s what happened to us. Fuzz told us he was in a séance for several days, and that is why so many things resulted.”
Caley found this to be strange but understood what they were talking about since she had seen Fuzz talking to his dog when she encountered him earlier. Then she learned from them, Fuzz could be located at the crossroads in Shelltown. After evaluating the conversation with Strep and Topop as not having much bearing on the real facts of the case, she decided to pick up where she had left off, and see if she could find Fuzz. After all, when she saw him near Avant’s house, he promised to “talk it over with Cricket” to see if she had any ideas on who killed the men. On her way to find Fuzz, her thoughts wandered.
Could fiction be stranger than truth? In the swamps of the Lowcountry, that has been the rule for hundreds of years. Naw, couldn’t be!
Chapter 48
On her way to Shelltown, she pulled into Flood’s Place, where Big Al and Tee were sitting at the picnic table, which had been retrieved from where the tornado had set it on top of the church debris. They exchanged greetings as she had with Strep and Topop.
“Well, I just came back from talking to the two black men you thought killed the Homer and Henry. In spite of what you said about them, I doubt they had anything to do with it. I wanted to ask you some more questions about that and about the death of Harley Kettle. Have you heard about Harley?”
“Yes, we heard that somebody killed him and dumped him at Adam’s Run. We don’t know anything about Harley, and we already told you all we know about our friends Homer and Henry. As to Harley Kettle, as far as we are aware, he never hangs out around here. So, we don’t know much about him.”
“Have any of you ever met Harley Kettle?”
Big Al said, “I met him once, but like I said we never talked much.”
Tee said, “I never met him.”
Then Caley asked several questions about Henry and Homer’s activities leading up to the day they were killed. She noticed right away that Big Al’s attitude had changed about Strep and Topop. His feelings were one hundred and eighty degrees different from before. Not having the benefit of knowing about the change of heart about helping the church people and Strep after the tornado, she was surprised.
His behavior, right after getting the same impression from Strep and Topop totally floored her. So much that she said, “When we spoke a few days ago, you were convinced the two black men up the road, killed Homer and Henry. Now you have changed your mind. What’s different now?”
Big Al went on to explain that after the tornado, they had all agreed to be more helpful to the people of the community than fight against them. He went on to explain how they had all gotten together and organized the cleanup and rebuilding of the church as well as helping rebuild th
e house and clean up Strep’s property.
Caley didn’t for a minute believe all she had heard. “I can’t believe this is happening,” is all she could think. In any case, the possible change in the community’s social attitude was all well and good, but it wasn’t helping solve the case. As a matter of fact, she had just wasted a full day talking to people that may be crazy, or worst, in the case of Strep and Topop---they believed in the paranormal. In addition, in Big Al’s case, he naïvely thought that human nature is as easy to change as flipping a switch. That, or as often happens with these people, they all were feeding her a bunch of baloney. She had to admit that sometimes she couldn’t tell the difference. Also, to complicate matters, the election was coming up in a few days, and the sheriff was fully engaged in politics hoping to save his job. He hadn’t even spoken with Caley about this or any other official matter for days.
Chapter 49
Election Day! Sheriff Wilson voted early. He performed his last political chore by standing outside one of the voting stations handing out business cards. Several of his longtime supporters and friends extended a warm thank you for a job well done. Other candidates were doing the same outside voting stations in and around Warrenton.
Of course, Skip Hanford was voting too. The difference was that Skip had more people among his supporters, some of which were carrying signs expressing his political virtues. Upon arriving at the poll and seeing the Hanford crowd, Wilson became more depressed. He continued to go forward and put on a happy face for his followers, few that they were.
Coming out of the voting booth, Wilson took off his and waved it to the ten or so people he saw. A few waved back and one old lady, said, “Good luck Thad. We know you gonna win.”
“Yes, I plan to,” he replied with less confidence that you might expect from an enthusiastic candidate.
Then he got into his sheriff’s car and drove off, still exercising his authority while he still could. He entered his office and sat at his desk for the rest of the day without taking a single call. All he could do was look out the window, and brood over his prospects for winning, which he knew was slim.
In only a few hours, all will know who will be the next sheriff of Warrenton County!
Chapter 50
It was the morning after the election. Returns were in, and the winners were celebrating. The losers were crying in their beer. Sheriff Wilson was among the people losing their jobs. He didn’t even come into his office at the jail, which was very unusual for him.
Most of the employees were somewhat uneasy about the sheriff-elect, while others were looking forward to changes. Caley had barely spoken to Skip Hanford who won by a landslide. Not that she disliked the policies on which he had campaigned, but that she wanted to remain as neutral as possible. Since she came to the job Sheriff, Wilson was the only boss she had known. In spite of his quirky personality, he was an excellent boss, and she was now somewhat apprehensive about the upcoming change.
Almost two weeks had gone by, and neither Sheriff Wilson nor Hanford had visited the jail or his new office since winning the election. If he was communicating with Sheriff Wilson, the sheriff was not letting anyone know. Rumors were proliferating throughout the department.
Finally, Sheriff Wilson made his appearance. Skip Hanford was present, but Caley wasn’t sure who invited him. It must have been Wilson, but at this point, it didn’t really matter. Wilson began by saying that officially he was still the sheriff, but was turning things over to Hanford.
He asked most of the supervisors who could leave their place of work, to gather in his office. There were six people including Caley. Sheriff Wilson spoke from behind his old desk, and the other attendees squeezed in on the other side of the room. Skip Hanford was standing beside Wilson.
“I want to thank you all for your service and support to me over the past years.”
He went on to call out a few people by name, one of which was Caley and said he could not have done the job without their support and dedication. The ceremony, if you could call it that, was strained and uncomfortable for everybody in the room. After giving a few humorous comments about incidents in the past, the sheriff took off his badge and laid it on the desk. Then he simply put his pistol on the desk. Very disappointed at the election outcome, he wasn’t about to hand the credentials directly to Hanford. Nor was he going to take the traditional step of pinning the badge on the newly elected sheriff. As tears wailed in his eyes, he said, “well this is it, folks. Good luck and God bless all of you.”
Sheriff Wilson, the now-former Sheriff, walked out the door and left Skip Hanford standing in front of the others with the badge on the desk and an empty expression on his face.
He carefully picked up the badge, held it in his hand a few seconds, and looked at it solemnly. Then he pinned it on his own chest with care. The ceremony was almost over.
“Even though I haven’t been sworn in yet, I’ll begin my duties by thanking each of you for your service to the people of this county in the past and ask you to continue to give me the support you have given my predecessor. I will be in touch on a one on one basis with each of you within the next few days. Thank you.”
So much for a public change of command ceremony, some people were expecting. A customary invitation to the mayor to welcome the new sheriff and the obligatory well wishes to the outgoing sheriff wasn’t happening. Everyone knew that Wilson was licking his wounds after losing the election. Most of the employees, including Caley, felt sorry for him and expressed their feelings privately.
No matter how the turnover of the sheriff’s duties went, now Skip Hanford was in charge, and he was intent on doing the job he had promised the people.
Later he called the mayor and told him what happened. The two agreed that Hanford was now the sheriff and the swearing in would take place as soon as possible.
Chapter 51
The new sheriff started getting briefed by the full-time civil servant supervisors on the status of their work. He was a methodical and careful man who recognized the value of going slow. The last thing he wanted to do was to make significant changes during the first few weeks on the job. His ideas and footprint on the department would come in time—slow and methodical was what he had learned early in his career. There would be plenty of time to implement changes.
The first major issue on his agenda was to review outstanding issues. There were several changes department heads felt were important to them. These changes could wait thought Skip. He needed time to consider the ramifications of any policy changes.
In a small county like Warrenton, major crimes were few and far between, but he, like most other people in the area, inside and outside of law enforcement, had heard about the murder of the two moonshiners.
When Skip called Caley in, her first thoughts were, I suppose the new sheriff will take the information I am about to tell him about former Sheriff Willson, release it to the press…and probably take full credit for a job well done for the citizens of the county. Some things are predictable in this business, no matter who wears the sheriff’s badge.
She asked Sweet to accompany her. She started the brief with the facts and then went into more detail as she came to the occurrences of the last few weeks. Most of the information she provided was on the status of the murders of Henry and Homer. Then she got to the recent events involving her suspicions about former Sheriff Wilson.
She continued, by saying that what she was about say should be held in strict confidence and that Wilson was unaware of what she was about to say. Then she went into the latest twist in the case introduced by the statement of Nellis Garvant about Kettle’s alleged involvement of some, yet, unknown politician. Based on the pending follow through on Kettle’s statement, the lead investigator for SLED had recommended that she wait to brief the new sheriff rather than brief Wilson. This would be especially appropriate since at this point it was nothing more than an allegation in an ongoing investigation.
After her run down on Kettle’s statement
, Skip only said, “interesting.”
“Yes, it certainly is sheriff. You can see this puts me in a strange situation and from this point forward, you will become part of the issue. If some politician is involved, we need to be sure we have all the facts, before we make any accusations. I certainly don’t want your first big case to be an embarrassment.”
“Well at this point it is nothing more than just another lead. I would like you to continue your work as you would normally have done if there had been no change in sheriffs. Also, keep Deputy Swenson involved so that any future second guessing about your work may be corroborated.”
“Yes sir,” replied Caley.
“It’s ironic that Wilson has spent his whole career putting men behind bars for crimes like the one he, himself seems to have committed. Unbelievable! I think I will brief the press on the progress of the case tomorrow. However, I believe that it’s best to leave out any reference to the accusation of the former sheriff until we get information that is more reliable. I’d like for you to be there with me Caley.”
Surprised at his invitation, which would have been unheard of from her previous boss, she said, “Certainly Sheriff.”
Then Caley thought… What do you know, there’s a new sheriff I town.
Chapter 52
With the new sheriff in place, things were beginning to settle down. But for Caley, she was still a long way from putting a bow the case of the murders. While Wilson was still in office, she was reluctant to confront him directly with Harley’s accusation of getting the murder weapon from him. When she did, she wanted a reliable witness. Not only that but she still had some doubts about the story given to her by Harley regarding Wilson getting him to plant the gun beneath Jim Avant’s house.
She still had respect for Wilson and her empathy for him after losing the election was even greater. After all, you couldn’t work for a person for as long as she had for Wilson and not have some respect for his unfortunate demise as sheriff.