by Bobby Norman
Hub backed up to get a good look. “How old’re you?”
Luther’d had just about enough of smart mouths and bad attitudes from ignorant backcountry inbreds. “My age has nothing to do with my abilities.”
“’Bil’ty takes time,” Hub replied with a smirk that said he’d been around the block more than once.
Luther slapped on his Smile of Superiority. “If you’ll notice,” he pointed out Hub’s side o’ the bars, “you are on that side of Incarceration,” then pointed out his side, “while I, on the other hand, am on this side of Freedom.” He then pointed to Toad and added just for chuckles, “Even that is on this side.”
The jab was lost on Toad ‘cause he was busy tryin’ to remember where Incarsurashun was.
“It would seem,” Luther continued, “initially at least, that I’m smarter than you. Also, Mrs. Lusaw only had fifty dollars and I was willing to take a drastic reduction from my usual fee. I need the experience.” Then he stuck his chin in the air. “You have the distinction of being my first murder trial.”
“How ‘bout that,” Hub said, givin’ Luther his Smile of Smartalecky, “Mine, too.”
“Soon,” Luther said, “I will be victorious, and famous, and you’ll be free.”
“Or in prison,” Hub said.
“Or maybe even dead,” Toad sniggered. He gave both of ’em his Smile of Smartassiness, displaying a mouthful of disgusting chompers.
“What a jovial little rat,” Luther said.
Hub rattled the cell door. “Come on, Toad, let ‘im in, I’m startin’ t’like ‘im.”
“Ah, Toad,” Luther said, looking him over like he might be the dumbest Homo Sapiens he’d ever come across. “An amphibian. My apologies to the rodent community.”
Toad unlocked the cell door. Luther entered, and Toad gave him the evil eye. “Smart ass.”
Toad relocked the door, started off, and out of earshot, Luther countered, “Dumb ass.” Then he pointed to Hub’s bunk. “Sit, we have a lot to do.”
Lootie Komes completed the last of her tasks, and she was spent. She had one final mission, and she was fearful of not having strength enough to carry it out. She stood next to the table in the center of her cold little shack. She was naked, and a horrible sight it was. Her nose and ears were disproportionate to her head. Her eyes were sunken, her face, skullish. She was humpty-backed, her spine twisted, forcing her to stoop and lean uncomfortably to the left. Sitting, standing, or laying down, the pain low in her back never let up. She couldn’t straighten out her legs. Her feet and toes were as warped as her hands and fingers. She hadn’t been able to wear shoes for years. Her tits and butt cheeks sagged like melted candle wax.
More than once that week, she’d weighed passing on cursing Hub and his family. After all, George and Matthew had murdered Hub’s sister. More than murdered. They’d defiled her. Badly. In the end, though, regardless o’ what George and Matthew had become, they were still her children and that was what had shifted the fulcrum point. Hub Lusaw and his family were gonna pay.
She spooned a decades-old gourd into a bowl on the table, the dark contents the consistency of blackstrap molasses. When she raised her arm over her head, her shoulder popped and she yelped. Pain slashed up her neck and exploded in the back of her head. It was yet another reminder that her life was approaching the midnight hour.
Luckily, she hadn’t spilled the gourd’s contents. Steadyin’ herself with half a dozen deep, careful breaths, she raised her arm again, slower, not quite as high, and anointed herself, ritualistically, with the thick, foul potion comprised of the remainder of fetid swamp water, and blood from the gator, the snake, and the boar.
Mumbling her chants, she worked the goo into her scarred scalp and pushed it over her wrinkled old face, stinging her eyes. She traced her finger along the scar that jaggered from her cheek to well into her scalp like she’d done all her life. All within the discoloration was dead. The lightnin’ had destroyed the nerves. As a child, she used to sit, trance-like, and trace its dead line without havin’ to see it.
The ooze rolled down her humped back and bone-slatted chest and globbed off her withered breasts hangin’ like rotted squash, onto a bulbous belly and down her spindly legs. She dipped the gourd into the stinking morass until it was gone.
CHAPTER 22
All the town’s hotels, restaurants, and saloons were packed. The only things in any abundance was beer, whiskey, and rumor. Three-cent watermelons were goin’ for a dime. Hookers were charging fifty percent more than usual and still didn’t have time to stand up between appointments. Reporters scurried about like rats, interviewing any and everone who’d had or even claimed to’ve had anything to do with the Komeses or the Lusaws.
It was standin’ room only outside the courthouse. Anybody passin’ out from the heat had to wait for the crowd to thin out ‘fore there was enough room to fall over. But if it was bad outside, the inside was just awful—everbody drenched in sweat, worthlessly swishin’ fans. The only air to breathe in was what somebody else’d breathed out, and if you got up to go outside for some fresh or to answer nature’s call, somebody grabbed your seat, so most people just sat it out, simmerin’ in their own juices and crossin’ their legs real tight.
Raeleen woulda preferred bein’ inside but she didn’t have anyone to watch the boys. They ran around jumpin’ and squealin’, gripin’ about bein’ hungry, havin’ to wet and wantin’ to go home. The waitin’ was Hell, not knowin’ what was goin’ on until the end o’ the day.
The bailiff, a vulturesque, Ichabod Crane-lookin’ thing with a prominent and active Adam’s apple, sat by the judge’s bench, lookin’ the crowd over and tryin’ not t’nod off.
His Honor, the ruddy-faced Almer Parks, sixtyish, occupied the Bench of Honor.
Totally out of his element, Hub Lusaw sat uncomfortably at the defense table alongside Luther P. Knox, Attorney-At-Law.
Sheriff Rowe, in new duds that weren’t gut-stretched all to Hell, was on the witness stand as the prosecuting attorney, Sam Dimwiddie—fiftyish, a well-padded, local good ol’ boy—paraded back and forth, stretchin’ out his suspender straps. This trial was his ticket to fame and fortune and he was gonna milk it for all it was worth.
“Now, Sheriff,” he began, lawyerly, “how was it you learned about the hap’nin’s on the night of August the seventeenth o’ this year?” Two days earlier, he and the sheriff had gone over all this and both knew it by heart.
“I’s at home, asleep,” Rowe replied, “and LeRoy Ledbetter come poundin’ on th’door blabbrin’ like a ravin’ idyit about trouble down t’th’Komeses.”
LeRoy was sittin’ in the gallery hopin’ t’God his name would come up. Now he was sorry it had. He had a headache, was sweatin’ like a draft horse, thirsty as a sponge, and had to take a piss so bad it hurt…and bein’ labeled a ravin’ idyit was all he had to show for it. Everbody craned their neck in his direction and snickered. He knew the whole town considered him a boob, and he’d hoped that bein’ The One Who Started The Ball Rollin’ On The Murder Of The Decade would turn that around, but now he’d been referred to as The Ravin’ Idyit in front of ever rumormonger and blabbermouth in town. He thought he may as well had I-d-y-i-t tattooed on his forehead.
“Did he say what that trouble was?” Dimwiddie continued.
“He didn’t know, just that they’s a ruckus he thought I oughta see ‘bout.”
“Would you please tell the court what you found upon your arrival at the Komes home?” If he’d been the defense attorney instead o’ the prosecution, it woulda been the Komes shack, but since he wanted to make the poor brain-pulpalized brothers look like they’d been wrongly done on, it was now the Komes home.
“When I got there it was quiet. Four ‘clock, give ‘r take, still dark. Their truck was parked out front ‘n th’front door was open. I called their names a couple o’ times but nobody answered so I pulled m’gun ‘n went in.” The questions and answers may have been scripted but he twitched nervously
, bein’ reminded o’ the scene. “They’s two bodies on th’floor, just inside th’front door, ‘n one alayin’ on th’couch.”
“And they were….”
“George ‘n Matthew Komes ‘n Ret Lusaw.”
“When you say Ret, you are referring to Loretta Lusaw? Sister o’ the accused?”
“Yessir.”
“Which one was it on the couch?” Anybody woulda assumed the one on the couch woulda been the girl but Dimwiddie was attempting to set the stage.
“Ret.”
“Was she settin’ up or layin’ down or just exactly what was her position?”
“She was laid out on ‘er back, covered with a blanket, tucked up under ‘er.”
“Tucked up under her, mm-hmm,” Dimwiddie replied, his eyes scrunched down like he was tryin’ to picture it. “And the brothers?”
“Like I said, in the front room, just inside th’front door, on th’floor, ‘parently where they fell.” The scripted crap and Dimwiddie’s bullshit demeanor was wearing thin. Rowe much preferred a stand-up fight and not all the legal fertilizer and dancin’ around he was bein’ forced to take part in.
“Mm-hmm,” Dimwiddie replied again, and then actin’ like he was thinkin’, he asked, “Did you happen to find anything queer or out o’ place?”
“Yessir,” Rowe said after a long, unscripted sigh, “a t’bacca pouch, rollin’ papers, spent matches, ‘n a pocket watch was settin’ on th’floor in front o’ th’couch.”
“A pocket watch you say. Have you since determined who that watch belonged to?”
“Yessir, it was Hub’s. He admitted it.”
“I see, well, that seems to simplify things doesn’t it? Was there anything else besides the pouch, the papers, and the pocket watch?”
“Yessir. Rubbed-out ceeg’rette butts.”
“Cigarette butts,” Dimwiddie repeated off-handedly. “Hmmm.” Then, puttin’ on like he’d miraculously put two and two together…. “Butts? Plural?”
“Yessir. Four of ’em.”
“Sheriff, what would four rubbed-out cigarette butts tell you?”
“That he’d had time t’roll ‘n smoke four ceeg’rettes waitin’ for th’Komeses t’….”
“Objection,” Luther chirped, jumpin’ up, “Your Honor, unless cigarette butts’ve learned how to talk, he doesn’t know that.”
The crowd laughed and the judge gave ’em the evil eye. “Objection sustained,” he declared, but the damage’d already been done. Everbody pictured a relaxed Hub Lusaw, his back to the couch, puffin’ out a chain o’ smoke rings, flickin’ ashes, and pickin’ his nose, waitin’, red-eyed and plottin’.
Luther sat down and Dimwiddie asked the sheriff, “What was the condition o’ the house?”
The sheriff glanced over at Hub. Two o’ the badly mutilated bodies in the shack—their heads and faces completely destroyed—had been done to by him. It was still a heinous sight. For the rest o’ his life, he’d be reminded of three mutilated bodies, pulverized brains, eyes hangin’ outside sockets, missin’ parts, and the smell of iron-rich blood mixed with piss and shit. “It was a mess. They’s blood evawhere.”
“Had they been shot with a gun?”
“No, sir,” the sheriff answered, robotically.
“Stabbed with a knife?”
“Ret’d had a knife used on ‘er, but I don’t know that you’cd actually say she’d been stabbed. I’d call it more cut than stabbed. They’s,” he tried to think of a better word, but none came, “parts. Removed. Missing.”
The sheriff’s last statement was ad lib, not somethin’ they’d rehearsed. Dimwiddie wanted to get away from it quickly and the best way to do it was to borrow Toad’s out—ignore it.
“Well, if they hadn’t been shot or stabbed, how’d they meet their end?”
Luther rolled his eyes and stood up. “Your Honor? Would you please instruct the prosecuting attorney to save his playacting for the stage and get on with it? If he doesn’t know how they died, he’s the only one within two hundred miles.”
The courtroom busted up, and Parks looked at Dimwiddie over his glasses. “You are slatherin’ it a mite.” He pounded his gavel. “Let’s keep it down, folks.”
“Sorry, Your Honor,” Dimwiddie apologized and turned his attention back to the sheriff. “For the record, would you please tell the court how they died?”
“Beat t’death. All of ’em.”
“At that time, did you know who the perpetrator was?”
“Only idee I had was what LeRoy’d said. He thought it was Hub agoin’ at it with ’em. He said he couldn’t hear good ‘nough at what was said, the exact words, but he heard ’em yellin’ ‘n he said one of ’em sounded like Hub.”
“And what happened when you went t’question Mr. Lusaw?” Dimwiddie asked while he passed the defense table and looked at Hub.
“I couldn’t. He’d lit out.”
“Lit out, huh? Then, how did you ultimately apprehend him?”
Rowe was reminded of Hub’s tellin’ him he never woulda caught him if he hadn’t surrendered. “He turned hisself in.”
“When he was confronted with the deed, did he deny doin’ it?”
“No, sir. He volunteered sole respons’bil’ty.”
Dimwiddie stepped to, and picked up a paper off the corner of the prosecution table and waggled it in the air for the jury and spectators to see. “Yes, he did. In fact…Hub Lusaw signed a confession…a full confession…for the cold-blooded murder of George and Matthew Komes.” He slapped the paperwork back on the table. “Was this the first time Hub Lusaw’d been at odds with the law?”
“Nope.”
Parks popped up like a Jack in the Box. “Come again?”
Assuming Parks hadn’t heard him, the sheriff sat up straighter and spoke louder. “I said, ‘No, sir.’”
“That’s not what I heard. You said ‘nope.’”
“Same thing ain’t it?”
“Not in this court. Try again.”
“No, sir,“ Rowe said. “Sorry, Your Honor,” then to Dimwiddie, “No, sir.”
“You’re a public official, dammit, and this is a court o’ law,” Parks chirped, hotly. “You don’t use that kind o’ language in here. I’d better not hear ‘yep’ either.” He pointed the gavel handle to Dimwiddie. “Go ahead.”
“Thank you, Your Honor. He’d been in trouble before. How many times d’you think?”
“I don’t know exactly, a lot.”
“Well, three? Half a dozen? A dozen?” Dimwiddie drilled.
“More like a dozen.”
“How many times would you say were for fightin?” Dimwiddie asked, swiveling toward the gallery.
“All of ’em.”
“All of ’em? My goodness. So…what?…he gets too much to drink….”
“No, I don’t know that he drinks much. He’s just got a temper. It cuts loose ‘n he don’t know how t’cap it off.”
“Thank you, Sheriff,” Dimwiddie said and turned to Parks. “Prosecution rests.” He sauntered back to his table and plopped into his chair.
“Mr. Knox,” Parks said, “your witness.”
Luther stood without leavin’ his table. It was meant to imply that anything the sheriff had to say wasn’t worth comin’ all the way around the table for. “Thank you, Your Honor.” He had a paper in his hand that he rolled and unrolled into a tube while he talked. The sheriff watched it like it was a snake. “Sheriff, I only have a couple of questions.” He pointed the tube at him. “You don’t like Hub, do you?”
“Not much,” the sheriff admitted, and shifted nervously in the seat. “He’s mean ‘n….”
Luther waggled the tube back and forth to cut him off. “Thank you,” he said. “Just answer the question.” He crossed his arms over his chest, but the tube was still evident. He was glad to see it was makin’ the sheriff nervous. “Weren’t you close to the deceased, the brothers?”
“I knew ’em. I don’t know as I’d say close.”
“No
? That’s odd. I heard different. I heard you were very close. In fact, I heard you were one o’ the few that got along with ’em. Went hunting together and such. They ever spend time in one o’ your cells?”
“Once ‘r twice, maybe.”
“It was more than once or twice,” Luther said, and the sheriff watched while Luther unrolled the tube. He took his time to look the paper over, then raised his eyebrows a couple o’ times as if somethin’ special’d caught his eye. “Quite a few more than once or twice. Isn’t it also a fact, that in your younger, more mischievous years, you and the Komes brothers all slept off a few bottles? In the same cell? At the same time?” Rowe looked trapped. Luther rolled the paper back up. “That was a question, Sheriff.” Rowe glared at him. “Requiring an answer. Don’t make me swear up your predecessor. He’s old and lives outside of town, but I will if I have to.”
“We were just kids blowin’ off a little steam,” the sheriff finally said, “’’n we didn’t beat nobody t’death.”
“Right. But then no one had raped…tortured…or murdered your sister. Ethel. Had they?”
The sheriff looked like he’d been kicked in the gut. Luther had just earned his fifty bucks and then some. It was a brilliant move and so simple. Every man in the room who had a sister, pictured her butchered, gutted like a fish, layin’ on that couch, and vicariously pictured themselves, as Hub had done, exacting bloody revenge.
“That’ll be all,” Luther said and sat down.
Parks nodded to Rowe. “You can step down now.”
The sheriff rose and on his way back to the spectator gallery, Luther helt out the rolled paper to him and winked. The wink caught Rowe so off guard that he took the paper without thinkin’. He pushed through the squeaky little spring-loaded gate in the ornate railing separating the gallery from the business end o’ the court and continued down the aisle.
He pushed through the back door in dire need of a water closet and a stiff drink. Hurryin’ across the floor, he unrolled the paper. He stopped dead and looked back at the closed doors as if he could see through ’em and to the back of Luther Knox’s head. His jaw muscles rolled up to his temple. There was only one word on the paper, written in a nice hand.