Pitch

by William Ollie

  “I will. Thanks, Mary,” he said, knowing that when he did get home, an all out war was sure to break out.

  “Do you love your wife, Billy?” Pitch asked him.

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “If you love her, why do you hit her?”

  “Shit, Dickie, she bitches and raises so much hell, until I just can’t help myself. A man can only take so much of that shit, you know.”

  “Oh yes, I understand completely. If I were you, I’d just kill her ass.”

  “Say what?”

  “Billy, look into my eyes.”

  “What?”

  “Let me show you a little trick.”

  “What kinda trick?”

  “Something amazing.”

  “Well, sure, I guess. Go ahead,” the uneasy miner replied.

  Billy Dillon, drunk from the river of beer he’d tossed down his throat, looked into the eyes of William Pitch. His eyes, already half closed, began to feel heavier, as if his entire body had gone suddenly to sleep. He tried looking away, but for some reason, he couldn’t. The room tilted, slowly, at first, and then rocking back and forth as it might if it were a seagoing vessel; all while the ceiling pressed down, and the walls began to rumble slowly toward him. The walls, the ceiling and the pool tables, the booths behind Pitch, and then Pitch himself; everything disappeared, until Billy saw nothing but those piercing blue eyes, dizzy and disoriented, as his head—light as a feather now—began to lift off his shoulders and drift slowly away, as words tumbled and through the air, swirling as if each were coming at him from opposite directions: Charleston… Home… Wife… Gun…

  Billy took his cigarette from the ashtray, and slowly began crushing its red tip into the palm of his hand. Then he put the extinguished cigarette into his mouth, chewing and swallowing as he stared up at Pitch, who chuckled, and said, “Look away.”

  Billy turned away, laughing as he looked back at Pitch. “You call that a trick?”

  “You’re stronger than I thought. Most people can’t look away when I hypnotize them.”

  “Yeah, well, don’t quit your day job, Dickie boy,” Billy said, then, “I need to get goin’ before I pass out.”

  “See ya later, Billy.”

  “Yeah, later,” Billy said, and then stood up and stumbled out the front door.

  Pitch turned his attention back to his beer just in time to see Nathan Hayes walk through the other side of Donnie’s Tavern. Through the opening at the cash register, he watched Donnie give the sheriff of Baxter County a brotherly hug.

  “Amazing, absolutely amazing,” Pitch whispered, then, “I wonder if you’ll be on duty when Billy gets home.”

  * * *

  Billy Dillon drove past Henry Walker’s Esso Station, north, toward home and his waiting wife. But when he arrived at the bridge linking his Holler with the main highway, he passed it by.

  Up the mountain he went, into the dark West Virginia night, and if someone had asked him where he was going and what he was doing, he wouldn’t have had the slightest idea what to tell them.

  John Smith

  “Ah, yes,” the acne-scarred desk clerk said as he handed over a room key to Pitch’s young protégé. “Just what we need, another John Smith.”

  Smith accepted the key and walked off to the lounge, where he bought a gin and tonic. He stood for a moment at the bar, beside a blonde, who stared into his soft brown eyes with a look that said ‘fuck me, baby, every which way but loose’. Drink in hand, he walked off to the back of the room, selected a table and sat down in the dimly lit barroom, listening to a pathetic-sounding band crank out the sounds of the fabulous fifties.

  He noticed a woman three tables over checking him out, older, with jet-black hair, and dark red lips that reminded him of a Christmas bow. He looked her way a time or two, but she looked away. He read her like a road map, and knew it was just a matter of whether he would choose her or another.

  A waitress with big tits sauntered up to his table. “You okay here, baby?” she asked him.

  He returned her smile with one of his own, and asked her for another gin and tonic.

  She took his order, and then scurried off to the bar in her black leotards and skintight black mini, bringing a smile to Smith’s face when she walked away. Smith pulled a pill bottle from the inside pocket of his sports jacket, shook two shiny black capsules into the palm of his hand and tossed them into his mouth, and then washed them down his throat with the remainder of his gin and tonic.

  Upon returning, the waitress sat a drink in front of him, her pursed lips sending an unspoken invitation Smith’s way as he smiled up at her, laid a five dollar bill on her tray and told her to keep the change. Then he gave her another five, instructing her to give the lady in black another of whatever she was drinking.

  “Send her one from me,” he said, smiling as she walked away, knowing he could have her or any other woman he wanted. Of course he could. At thirty-eight, he still had a full head of wavy brown hair, and soft and inviting bedroom eyes.

  John Smith had it all: money, a sculptured body and a charismatic personality no woman could resist. A natural born actor with a line of bullshit five miles long, he could easily slip in and out of any dialect, such as the West Virginia twang he’d grown up speaking, but had left behind many years ago. He read women like the open books they were. The blonde at the bar, for instance, was either married or had been married a couple of times, and had run off a wimp of a husband who didn’t know how, or just plain couldn’t handle her. She wanted to lay that pussy on some poor bastard, drive his ass crazy, and then bust his balls into tiny little pieces.

  As for the lonely lady with the jet-black hair: the sad eyes gave her away. Her old man had either died or dumped her, and now here she was, too old to get anyone to commit. Then there was the waitress with the swinging ass. She’d gotten a glimpse of his fat roll of cash, and right away her tits swelled up to the size of bowling balls.

  His scalp tingled from the two amphetamines.

  It was time to choose.

  Who would it be, Blondie at the bar, Big Tits, or the lady in black?

  John Smith walked over to the lonely lady, flashed a warm and friendly smile, and asked her to dance, took her hand and led her onto the floor, and wrapped his strong, muscular arms around her.

  “Well,” she said. “What’s your name?”

  “Jonathan Smith,” he told her. “But my friends call me John.”

  “How original.”

  “I know. I get that all the time, but my name really is John Smith.”

  “Yeah, you’re John Smith, I’m Lois Lane, and this is a job for Superman. You seen him anywhere?”

  “Seen him? You’re dancing with him.”

  “Boy, are you smooth,” she said, laughing and relaxing her body.

  Pressing her tight against him, he said, “What is your name, really?

  “Marcia,” she said, and laid her head against his shoulder. “Marcia Lowrey.”

  When he invited her to his room, Marcia didn’t think there was any way that, she, Marcia Lowrey, a decent, clean-living and church-going woman, would allow herself to go. But when she opened her mouth, the words, “Yes, I’d love to” spilled from it.

  * * *

  As Billy Dillon drove blindly toward Charleston, West Virginia, William Pitch stood in the lobby of the Appalachian Hotel, having a friendly little conversation with the desk clerk. Afterward, he climbed the stairs to his room, and found the place no better with a belly full of beer than it had been without one. In fact, with the frayed window curtains and the Dust Bunnies floating along the floor, it looked much worse. Not to mention the lumpy mattress lying lopsided on its foundation. He stood for a moment, taking in his dismal surroundings, and then crossed the room and pulled the bedcovers back. He walked to the bathroom and tore the wrap from a tiny bar of soap, dropped it into the sink and ran some water over it. Then he shut off the water and stepped out of the bathroom. Four long strides took him over to a window l
ooking out on a darkened alleyway. Pitch parted the curtains, chuckling at a drunken couple fornicating in the dark.

  Same old toothless wonders.

  He shook his head, stepped away from the window and crossed the room. Then he was out the door and down the hallway, down the stairs and through the front door.

  * * *

  Marcia awoke to find her underwear wadded up and stuffed into her mouth, her mouth taped shut, wrists and ankles tied to the bed frame with strips of fabric cut from her black evening dress. She’d been sodomized and raped, but little did she know, that was the least of her problems, because sitting naked on the bed beside her, the madman, John Smith, was stroking a hand across her cheek, speaking soft and gently, as if he had not just brutally assaulted her, but was one of her closest and most concerned friends. “I know,” he said. “It just isn’t fair. You don’t deserve this… not you.”

  He showed her a shiny, stainless steel surgeon’s scalpel, and Marcia emitted a series of muted screams; leaned over and kissed her tear-soaked cheek, and she whimpered into her gag.

  “There, there,” he said. “It’ll be over before you know it.”

  Laughing now, giggling, he reached over to the nightstand and pushed the record button on his cassette recorder.

  Then he turned back to Marcia and smiled.

  * * *

  Billy Dillon arrived at his driveway hours after Mary Cousins told his wife he was on his way home. He didn’t see that lovely woman standing silently in the shadows when he staggered through the front door, and when he tiptoed past her, the simmering teapot that was Eunice Dillon finally blew its top. She stepped forward, raising a ten-pound rolling pin over her shoulder, and then clubbed her drunken husband in the back of his head, dropping Billy Dillon as if he’d been shot through the heart with a hunting rifle.

  * * *

  Halfway up her mountain, Maudie Mason sat up in bed.

  “God help me,” she whispered, recalling the horrible nightmare that had stirred her from her sleep. In her dream, a handsome couple danced. Later they made love, and the horrors began. He choked her from behind, and tied her hands and legs to the bed frame. He teased her and taunted her, beat her and slashed her, smashed her in the face.

  Then the real horrors began.

  Maudie turned on the light and looked at the clock. It was 5:00 a.m.

  She walked to her rocking chair, picked up her bible and thumbed through its pages.

  “God help us,” she prayed.

  Sunday Morning

  3:00 A.M.

  John Smith whistled a happy tune as he put his briefcase in the trunk of a car he’d bought the day he arrived from California. He got behind the wheel and drove aimlessly through the deserted streets, thinking of his date and how good she’d made him feel. A left turn took him past the Kanawha County Courthouse. Minutes later, he parked his car and walked over to a fountain sitting in front of the golden dome of the Capital Building. Three fifty-cent pieces were drawn from his pocket and tossed into the fountain, bringing forth from Smith a single wish: “Let me bring him to his knees.”

  Smith returned to his car and drove away, not stopping until he arrived at the Traveler’s Inn. Once inside room 17, he went straight to the bathroom and removed the pill bottle from his pocket, shook three Seconals into his eager hand and popped the capsules into his mouth, washing them down with a handful of tap water before walking back to his room and stripping down to his underwear, and lying down on the floor. Hands locked behind his neck, he began his sit-ups. At four hundred, he rolled over and knocked off a hundred push-ups without even stopping. Finished with his exercises, he walked to the shower and adjusted the water temperature to very hot. While showering, he thought of Marcia Lowrey, and began singing the Hendrix tune he’d been hearing on the radio lately, stumbling through the lyrics; getting some right and getting some wrong, always ending with Foxy Lady!

  After drying, he walked into the adjoining room to admire himself in the cheap motel room mirror. He felt good, thoroughly relaxed after his daily routine.

  Maybe I’ll get a run in tomorrow, he thought as he climbed into bed.

  Then he pulled the covers up to his chin and waited for the Seconals to carry him off to sleep, where he would dream what any sane man would consider to be the most hideous of nightmares.

  But not Smith.

  Of course, John Smith hadn’t been sane for many years now.

  Daybreak

  Nathan Hayes sat on the front porch of his modest three-bedroom home, waiting for the sun to rise over the mountain. This was Nathan’s favorite part of the day, everything peaceful as the foggy mountain mist began to clear. If he was quiet, he might see a deer or two foraging through the brush, a dog or two running up the mountainside. He sipped his morning coffee, leaning back in his chair while Godby’s Branch came to life, birds chirping, squirrels running through the trees; cows mooing down the Branch as roosters crowed and chickens ran cackling around their pens, and Sharon Hayes came through the front door, long blonde hair falling across her slender shoulders, as she said, “Good morning, sweetheart.”

  “Mornin’, baby, what’s for breakfast?”

  “Pancakes and sausage?”

  “Sounds great!” Nathan loved her pancakes.

  “How’d it go last night?”

  “Just the way I like it, nice and quiet.” He took another sip of coffee. “We didn’t even have to go out to Billy Dillon’s place.”

  “Probably killed each other and nobody knows it yet.”

  Nathan chuckled.

  “Look there!” Sharon whispered, pointing up the mountain at a deer chewing on a piece of bush.

  “Isn’t that precious?” Nathan said, then, “God, I love it out here.”

  “You talk to Donnie last night?”

  “Yeah, they’re coming over after church. Called Daddy yesterday and told him and Mama to come on out, too. It’s getting to be that time of the year, and I don’t want them being alone.”

  “Well, you know I love having them over, and the boys love it, too.”

  “Yeah, well, they’re coming after church lets out.”

  “Speaking of church, I’d better get them boys up and moving, put some food on the table.”

  Sharon stood up and started back inside, and Nathan walked out to the mailbox to get the newspaper. On his way back, he stopped and took a deep breath of cool, clean mountain air, looked up at the sky, and said, “God, I love it out here.”

  * * *

  Billy Dillon squinted up at the ceiling, wondering what the hell had happened to him last night. One minute he was drinking a beer with some old coot in Donnie’s. The next thing he knew he was lying in bed trying to remember the license plate of the dump truck that had run over his head.

  He rolled over and looked at the clock, which seemed awfully blurry this morning. “Eleven-thirty? No way.”

  Billy sat up, bemoaning his aching head as he put his hands to his temples and lay back down, trying to recall what he’d done after leaving Donnie’s. But all he could remember was getting up and walking out.

  Eunice stepped into the room, stifling a laugh when she saw the confused and painful expression on her husband’s pale face. In one hand she carried a glass of water. The other held four aspirins. “Here, sweetheart,” she said, holding the water and aspirin out to him. “Take some medicine.”

  Billy accepted his medicine with shaking hands. After washing down the aspirin, he looked up at his wife. “What happened to me last night?”

  “I don’t know, Billy. I got tired of waitin’ up for you, finally went on to bed about one o’clock. Heard you come in and went running to the living room ready to raise holy hell, and found you passed out on the floor. Somehow I got you to bed and put some blankets over you.”

  Eunice, smiling fondly, remembered the rolling pin sweeping down, Billy’s body crumpling to the floor.

  “Maybe I should eat somethin’, Eunice.”

  “I got us some lunch made
. I’ll go get you some.”

  “You’re an angel, darlin’.”

  “Gotta take care of my man, don’t I?” Eunice said, smiling as she walked away, wondering why she hadn’t whacked that silly bastard a long time ago.

  Pops

  Harold “Pops” Burgess had been a member of the police department since 1925. In forty-three years, he had seen it all: rapes and murders, kidnappings where the victim had turned up dead, or worse, hadn’t turned up at all. But in all his years on the job, he had never, ever, seen anything quite like this.

  Pops and his partner, John Slaney, and Bill Grady, Charleston’s Chief Medical Examiner, stood by the bed while Charley Reid photographed the body and crime scene, and Danny Boggs dusted for fingerprints.

  “Christ,” said Slaney. “Looks like she was shredded by a bear.”

  “What’ve we got, Billy?” Pops asked the M.E.

  “A queasy stomach,” Grady said, pausing a second or two, before adding, “Her face, or what’s left of it, was slashed by a razor-sharp blade. I’m guessing a box cutter, maybe a surgeon’s scalpel. Her nipples, Jesus Christ, they’re in the bed sheets, and she’s got cigarette burns all over her.”

  “Fuck,” Slaney whispered.

  “What else, Billy?” Pops said.

  Obviously there was more.

  Bill Grady sighed, took a deep breath and continued, “Her face has been … shredded, most of her teeth knocked out. The ring finger of her left hand’s missing. Where the hell it is, we don’t know. And after—”