The Essay A Novel

  Finally, I nodded toward the Ford. “That’s the truck that Edgel drives when he makes pickups for the Farnsworths,” I said. “The Rocket 88 isn’t here, either. He always parks it right there in that open spot inside the gate.”

  “He lied to me?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know, Mom, I don’t know.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  M

  y mom sobbed and struggled to catch her breath all the way home from the junkyard. I was silent in my disappointment. By the time we got back to the house, the orange glow had intensified in the distance. The newscaster on WCHI said that Elk Township Fire Chief Deek Daniels had decided to allow the fire to burn itself out. There were no fire hydrants that far out in the township and the pumper trucks were virtually useless in fighting a fire of that magnitude. It was, after all, a large, wood frame building that housed tons of lumber. There was nothing in the building that wasn’t fuel.

  Neither of us could go back to bed. We sat on the porch swing, hands shoved deep in our coat pockets, our breath turning to vapor, and watched the orange glow until it was drowned out by the sunrise, which in turn revealed a haze of white smoke that had rolled into the hillsides. At six-thirty, just as I was preparing to get ready for school, I spotted a cloud of dust rising from where Red Dog Road intersects with County Road 12. The dust billowed in brown clouds that moved up the road. I watched the rising dust until the sources revealed themselves in the clearing below our property— three Vinton County Sheriff’s cruisers. Two of the cars came up our drive; the third parked across our drive on Red Dog Road, blocking any escape route.

  “Oh God, oh God, oh God,” my mother cried.

  “Mom, go on inside. I’ll talk to them.”

  The two cars that ascended the drive did so in a slow, deliberate manner. They were doubtlessly scanning the property for my brother. When the lead car stopped in front of the house, Sheriff McCol-lough stepped out, hitching up his belt and scanning the tree line, his trademark toothpick wedged in the corner of his mouth. Two frowning deputies exited from the second car. The sheriff hadn’t changed much since the day I had been hitting stones in the yard when he came looking for Edgel the last time. I knew this was about to be a repeat of that meeting. “G’ morning,” he said, touching the brim of his black, cowboy-style hat.

  “Morning, Sheriff.”

  “Your brother hereabouts?”

  “Which one?”

  “Edgel.”

  I shook my head. “No, sir.”

  The sheriff removed his hat and squinted into the morning sun as he looked around the property, craning his neck as he checked out the old shed in the back. He slowly removed a handkerchief from his hip pocket and wiped out the sweatband of his hat before using it on a wide forehead, though I didn’t see any sign of perspiration. “Where is he?” He put his hat back on and adjusted it low on his brow. “I need to talk to him.”

  “I don’t know, Sheriff, and that’s the God’s truth. He said he had to work last night and I haven’t seen him since.”

  “Working, huh? Where’s he working?”

  “Farnsworth Salvage.”

  “That’s an odd time to be working for a junkyard, the middle of the night, wouldn’t you say?”

  I shrugged. “He delivers and picks up parts. He has lots of odd hours.”

  “Uh-huh. He’s not in that house, is he, son?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Mind if I come in and have a look around?”

  “I don’t think that would be such a good idea right now, Sheriff. My mom’s in there and she’s been pretty upset lately. She and my dad split up, and I think this would just upset her more.”

  “Where’s your dad?”

  “Florida. He went down there to work with Virgil at the carnival.”

  “I thought he was working at the sawmill.”

  “He was, but he lost that job.” It was information I suspect he already knew.

  He nodded. “You know, it would be pretty easy for me to get a search warrant for that house.”

  “You could, but it would be a waste of your time. I told you, Sheriff, he’s not here.”

  The sheriff pulled a business card out of his wallet and walked it up the steps to me. “When you see Edgel, you tell him it’s real important for him to get in touch with me immediately.”

  “Yes, sir, I will.”

  As he started back down the steps, he turned, the brim of his hat covering his face in shadow. “Aren’t you a little curious about why we want to talk to him?”

  “My dad got fired from Morgan’s mill and it burned to the ground last night. Edgel did nine years for arson. It doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to figure out why you want to talk to him.”

  He winked and said, “Be sure to tell him to call.”

  “I will.”

  “You’ve got a big game tonight, don’t ya?” he asked as he reached for his cruiser door.

  “The biggest I’ve ever played in.”

  “Good luck with that.”

  “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

  I watched as the cruisers turned around in the dried foxtail, leaving treadmarks in the frost, and headed back down the drive. The three cruisers parked at the bottom of the hill as the sheriff and deputies talked, I assumed, about how to keep an eye on the place. As the officers conversed, the school bus rolled to a stop at the bottom of the drive. When the door opened, one of the deputies walked over and spoke to the bus driver for a full minute. When he stepped away, the bus continued down Red Dog Road to the turnaround. I planned to go to school late as I didn’t want to run out on my mother and I was hoping for a chance to speak to Edgel.

  According to our quarterback and offensive captain Roy Otto, Coach Battershell was apoplectic when the bus arrived at school without me. Word must have reached Miss Singletary about the same time and she went running to the gym. “Where is he?”

  “I have no idea,” said Coach Battershell.

  They both looked at Roy, who shrugged. “I haven’t seen him since we left the spaghetti dinner last night.”

  Coach Battershell sent Roy to the office to tell Principal Speer to get someone to cover his classes because he was driving out to our house. Roy said Miss Singletary ran out of the school behind the coach. They jumped into Coach’s Pontiac and headed toward Red Dog Road.

  I was able to pick up the story shortly after this point as a parade of cars climbed our rocky drive. It was eight thirty when Edgel’s Rocket 88 turned off of Red Dog Road into our drive. Coach Battershell’s Tempest was right behind him, followed by two Vinton County Sheriff’s cars, which had been hidden in the brush near the entrance to the dump. The cruisers charged up the hill with red lights flashing and sirens echoing off the hills. Coach Battershell stopped his car when he saw the lights and the sheriff’s cars bound hard over the rocky edge of the driveway—one to the left, the other to the right—bouncing through the rock and weeded hillside and navigating around the rusting remains of the two-hundred-dollar specials, finally catching up to the Rocket as it pulled up alongside the front porch. The sheriff’s cars slid broadside in the dirt and gravel in front of the house, sending up plumes of dust as the deputies climbed out with pistols drawn, screaming at Edgel to get his hands where they could see them.

  Edgel looked up at me. Though I couldn’t hear him over the dying sirens and the screaming deputies, I read his lips. “What the fuck?”

  “Shut up and keep those hands where I can see them,” yelled one deputy with a brush cut and moon-shaped scar around his right eye. The three deputies surrounded the car, holding their revolvers with both hands and pointing them at Edgel’s head.

  Not being a total stranger to this routine, Edgel kept both hands on top of his steering wheel and did not move. One deputy opened the door while the other two barked at Edgel to get out of the car and on the ground. Edgel turned in the seat and dropped out of the car to his knees, hands interlocked behind his head. One of the deputies gave him a push and he went down
hard on the side of his face. The same deputy holstered his revolver and handcuffed Edgel behind his back.

  “We got a lot of questions for you,” said the deputy with the moon scar.

  “Am I under arrest?” Edgel asked.

  “We’ll be the ones asking the questions, Hickam.” He spat out the name Hickam as though he had a mouthful of dog piss.

  “I’ve got the right to know if I’m under arrest.”

  “Right now, you’re being held on suspicion of arson.”

  Edgel raised his head, one side was covered with dust and flecks of red dog, and said to me, “Tell Mom to call Mr. Crawford and have him meet me at the jail.”

  Timothy Crawford had been Edgel’s court-appointed attorney on the burglary charge years ago. Moon Scar leaned down close to Edgel’s face and sneered, “Lawyering up already, Hickam? I’d say that’s a sure sign of someone who knows his ass is in the soup.”

  “I know my rights, deputy, and I’m not saying another word until I speak with my attorney.”

  Moon Scar watched as the other two deputies each hooked him under an arm and lifted Edgel to his feet. He looked at me for a moment and his eyes held a desperation that I had never seen, even when he was in prison. As they lowered his head and shoved him into the back of one of the cruisers, Coach Battershell and Miss Singletary walked up to the porch. Inside, I could already hear Mom talking to the receptionist at the Athens law firm of Crawford and Oschendorf.

  As the two cruisers headed back down the drive and toward the county jail in McArthur, Mom came running out of the house and down the steps. “Where are you going?” I asked.

  “Down to the jail. My boy needs me. I’ll call when I know something.” Coach and Miss Singletary stood on the porch with me while Mom gunned the pickup, throwing pebbles against the bare lattice at the bottom of the porch.

  “What’s going on?” Miss Singletary finally asked.

  “They just took Edgel in for suspicion of arson,” I said.

  “Oh no, for the fire at the sawmill?” she asked.

  “I think that’s a safe bet.”

  “Where was he last night?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. Hopefully, working.” But in my mind I could visualize Edgel parked along a dirt road on the top of a hillside, sitting on the hood of the Rocket 88, his back resting against the windshield, sipping a bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon and laughing as he looked down on the carnage he had created. “What are you guys doing here?”

  “Looking for you,” Coach Battershell said. “I know you probably have a lot on your mind right now besides football, but you can’t play tonight if you’re not in school today.”

  “I know. I’ll be there. I’ll get my stuff together and take the Rocket. Edgel’s not going to need it today.” I started toward the door, but the coach and Miss Singletary just stood on the top step. “What?”

  “We’ll just wait here and give you a ride,” Coach said. “Hustle up.”

  Hardly anybody at school was talking about the fire. Weeks after my winning the essay contest was announced, students continued to debate the veracity of my victory. But when one of the biggest employers in Vinton County burned to the ground, barely a word was spoken. Mostly everyone was buzzed about that night’s game with McArthur Central Catholic.

  Three times that day, I went to the school office and called home, but no one answered. I listened to the noon news on the radio in Coach Battershell’s office. They interviewed the fire chief and carried a couple of minutes about the fire. The reporter said a suspect had been taken into custody for questioning, but no arrests had been made and no other details were available.

  After school, Mrs. Ullrich of the athletic mothers was at the entrance of the locker room passing out bulbous, white mums to senior football players and cheerleaders. “What’s this for?” I asked.

  “Pin it to your mom’s coat for the senior night introductions,” she said. “It goes on the left.”

  I had completely forgotten that it was senior night, and I was certain that my mom hadn’t given it a thought since seeing her oldest son hauled away in the back of the sheriff’s cruiser. I stood to the side and waited for Mrs. Ullrich to hand out all of her mums. “Mrs. Ullrich, don’t announce me tonight.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I don’t have anyone here. My dad’s in Florida and Mom’s busy. She can’t be here.”

  “Jimmy Lee, that’s too bad. Are you sure you don’t want to walk by yourself? I hate to see you miss senior night.”

  I forced a smile and set the mum in the cardboard tray she was holding. “Thanks, Mrs. Ullrich, but I’d rather miss it than walk by myself.”

  The booster club fed us a pre-game meal of pancakes and sausage at four o’clock in the school cafeteria. I mostly picked at the food, unable to force anything into a stomach that was knotted high in my chest. Afterward, we stretched out on the wrestling mats in the gymnasium and relaxed, taking turns going to the training room to get our ankles taped. Gary Rittenhouse, our standout defensive end, had driven over to the little general store in Zaleski to pick up a copy of the Vinton County Messenger. Every Friday in the fall, the sports editor for the Messenger ran a photo of himself in a turban, gazing wild-eyed into a crystal ball, and predicted the outcomes of that night’s high school football games. We had great fun reading his predictions and they served as minor inspiration as he predicted we would lose nearly every week. This week was no exception.

  The East Vinton Elks have been the area’s surprise team of the year, contending for a Black Diamond Conference championship and posting their first eight-win season since the Eisenhower Administration. Unfortunately for the men in navy and silver, the fun ends tonight. The undefeated McArthur Central Catholic Crusaders have won six consecutive conference championships and have no intentions of losing to the upstarts from the eastern side of the county. With bruising fullback Reno DiGaudio leading the way, the Crusaders roll, 35-6.

  “Ouch,” Rittenhouse said. “He doesn’t even think it will be close.”

  “We’ll invite him out here for a nice crow dinner after we beat their asses tonight,” I said.

  “I like your attitude, boss.” He pushed himself off the mat. “I’m going to get taped.” As he passed me, he dropped the paper on my chest.

  I read the other predictions and casually flipped through the paper. When I folded and tucked the sports section away, I was face-to-face with a front-page banner headline:

  Morgan Lumber Burns to Ground

  And the subhead:

  Convicted Arsonist Edgel Hickam

  Jailed by Sheriff for Questioning

  The Morgan Lumber Company, one of Vinton County’s largest employers, burned to the ground this morning in a blaze so intense that area firefighters had little choice but to allow the fire to burn itself out.

  The fire was reported by a Vinton County Sheriff’s deputy shortly after 1 AM. Soon after, the orange glow of the inferno could be seen for miles away as the fire was fed by the tons of timber stacked inside the wood-frame mill.

  By noon, the building had collapsed into the sub-basement and was largely contained within the 100-year-old stone and brick foundation.

  Meanwhile, a local man with a previous conviction for arson was picked up by sheriff’s deputies this morning and is being held in the Vinton County Jail for questioning. Sheriff Malcolm McCollough identified the man as Edgel R. Hickam, 29, of 10107 Red Dog Road in Knox Township.

  Hickam was convicted of a single count of burglary and arson in 1966 and sentenced to 12 years in prison. McCollough said Hickam was a suspect in several other burglary-arsons.

  He was recently paroled from the state reformatory in Mansfield.

  “Mr. Hickam has been less than cooperative,” Sheriff McCollough said. “He must understand that given his criminal history, he needs to work with us if he hopes to clear his name.”

  McCollough said a relative of Hickam worked at Morgan Lumber until recently being fired. A source close t
o the investigation said the relative was Hickam’s father, Nicholas.

  Calls to the Hickam residence were not answered.

  The story was accompanied by two black-and-white photos— a six-column photo of firefighters standing around the building’s smoldering remains and a mug shot of Edgel from his first arrest.

  The story went on in painful detail for many more paragraphs, but I had read all I could stomach. I dropped the sports section on the mat, balled up the rest of the paper, and threw it in the trash on my way to get my ankles taped.

  Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one in Vinton County who had seen the story.

  At six thirty, Roy Otto and I led our team to the field for warmups. A half-dozen guys from McArthur Central Catholic were standing inside the gate next to the cinder track that led from our locker room to the field. When they saw me coming, each pulled a cigarette lighter from their pocket and began flicking it on and off. “Hey, Hickam, how’s your brother—ol’ Sparky?” one asked. Flick, flick, flick. “Smokey says, ‘Only you can prevent lumber mill fires,’” said another. Flick, flick, flick. “How about a little fire, scarecrow?” said a third. Flick, flick, flick. My face was burning with anger, and I ran harder to get to the field.

  Elk Stadium was in a low area behind East Vinton High School, built on the floodplains of Raccoon Creek. It was a modest stadium with wooden bleachers and dim lights that befit the quality of teams that East Vinton had produced over the years. On this night, however, the atmosphere was electric. The stands on both sides of the stadium were full and crowds stood three deep all around the field. It was the largest crowd that I had ever played before. For the first time since three o’clock that morning, Edgel, the burning sawmill, and my distraught mother left my thoughts. Adrenaline surged through my chest and I screamed, yelling until my face was crimson and my head began to ache at my temples. It was game time, and I was ready.

  There wasn’t much for Coach Battershell to say in the locker room before the game. We all knew how important this game was to us, our school, and the denizens of East Vinton County. We were playing for respect. “The future of this program rests on your shoulders,” he said calmly. “East Vinton has been a doormat in this league since before you were born. You have a chance to bring respect to this program and secure its future.” When he finished his talk, he said, “Seniors, go meet your parents.” The other seniors got up and started filing out. “Jimmy Lee . . .”